India should embrace ILO’s historic declaration on workplace safety

Given the regular occurrence of industrial accidents, workplace safety in India has become a matter of grave concern

Incidents such as the gas leakage in chemical and other factories in Andhra Pradesh’s Vizag in May 2020 and Anakapalli district on August 2, 2022, ferroalloy plant in Vizag in September 2021, and the fire accident in unregistered manufacturing electronics units in Mundka, New Delhi, have often occurred.

Given the regular occurrence of industrial accidents, workplace safety in India, despite the so-called “strict and rigid” labour regulations, has become a matter of grave concern. It is in this context we need to understand the adoption of “a safe and healthy working environment” as part of the fundamental and core labour rights by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in June 2022.

The ILO in 1998 adopted the historic declaration: Fundamental Principles of Rights and Work (FPRW). The FPRW recognised four principles of labour standards: freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining; the elimination of all forms of forced or compulsory labour; the effective abolition of child labour; and the elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation. For each of them, two ILO conventions were identified as core conventions.

It was expected that the member countries by virtue of their membership of ILO and their commitment to its Constitution, it is their obligation, irrespective of their ratification record of the said ILO conventions, to “respect, to promote and to realise, in good faith” the above-mentioned four sets of principles.

Following the FPRW, ILO and the core conventions enjoyed global legitimacy. India has ratified only six of the eight core conventions. It has not ratified C.87
and C.98 (freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining) for political reasons.

Even a casual perusal and analysis of the FPRW, one can see that the right to work-life safety, minimum wages, social security and others are among the core principles. Differences in economic growth between countries were a possible reason to refrain from adding them. However, the cruel reality of ever-rising workplace accidents globally cannot be disregarded for long.

The ILO estimates that some 2.3 million workers around the world experience work-related accidents or diseases every year, and this translates to over 6,000 deaths every single day. Worldwide, 340 million occupational accidents and 160 million workers suffer from work-related illnesses annually. The Covid-19 pandemic experience across countries intensified the concern over the enormity of all kinds of hazards.

Eventually, the ILO on June 10, 2022 adopted the historic declaration to include “a safe and healthy working environment” as the fifth principle of FPRW. Two ILO conventions relating to this are: Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Convention, 1981 (No. 155) and Promotional Framework for Occupational Safety and Health Convention, 2006 (No. 187).

According to ILO standards, there must be in place regulations to govern and ensure OSH in all branches of economic activity and they should cover all workers, including informal economy and MSMEs.

An adequately equipped, well-empowered (as per labour inspection convention of ILO) enforcement system must exist. The government must maintain a system of annual statistics on occupational accidents and diseases and publicise both statistics and the measures to tackle the exigencies arising out of the former. It is against these we must evaluate the institutional framework regarding OSH in India.

According to the Directive Principles of State Policy, among others, the State “shall make provision for securing just and humane conditions of work”.

We have labour laws providing for OSH in factories, mines, plantations, construction and other instruments in railways etc. It is well-known that OSH regulations do not mostly cover the informal sector. In the neo-liberal economy, the effectiveness of laws is questionable even in the organised sector.

On the other hand, the regional law, viz. the Shops and Commercial Establishments, covers unregistered factories and non-governmental segments of the service sector. But the OSH regulations in this law are slack and weak. There is no OSH law for the agricultural sector and the MSMEs which together account for more than half of the Indian workforce.

In fact, this is one of the reasons for India not ratifying C.155 even though the central government framed the OSH policy in 2009.

On the other hand, the Indian government following the neo-liberal policies of labour market deregulation has substantially liberalised the labour administrative and inspection system which anyhow covers only segments of the so-called organised sector.

We have, however, ratified the Labour Inspection Convention, 1947 (C.081). The statistical system concerning industrial accidents covers only registered factories, mines, ports/docks and railways. Notwithstanding strong regulations, readers of newspapers read frequent incidents of fatal workplace accidents.

There is no data on occupational diseases. In fact, the recent Delhi Mundka fire accident and others show the presence of a new problem: “legal invisibility” of working establishments. We don’t have estimates of them. Thus, we see there are serious and grave deficits in both regulations and implementation of OSH among others in the economy.

Notwithstanding all these and, in fact, because of these serious legal and institutional deficits, India must embrace the Declaration without any hesitation, as this measure will lead India on the path of restructuring and reforming the institutional system concerning OSH.

It is notable that the recently passed Occupational Safety Code does not cover all branches of economic activity and the prevalent regulations are inadequate. Thus, adoption of the 2022 Declaration of FPRW will lead to many positives and to eventually create a safe and healthy working environment. The economic and social benefits arising out of OSH need hardly be belaboured.

Business leaders will be quick to point out the costs involved in establishing an elaborate OSH environment as contemplated in laws or that industrial accidents occur because workers must be held accountable.

Monetary costs pale before costs of human lives. Statutory training and disciplinary action against erring workers will solve the operational failures. Right to safe workplaces (right to life) is simply a non-negotiable right. The NDA government must initiate the process of endorsing the Declaration as soon as possible, as India being a founding member of ILO has committed to the promotion of decent work, which involves safe work also.

(The author is a visiting professor, XLRI, Xavier School of Management, Jamshedpur)