Posted by Sruthi Nair

Editor’s Note: This month, that is January 2021, FII’s #MoodOfTheMonth is Work and The Workplace, where we invite various articles to highlight the profound changes that our workplaces may or may not have undergone and the effect that these changes have had on our personal and professional lives and ways of living in the time of the pandemic. If you’d like to share your article, email us at pragya@feminisminindia.com. 

In the Sabla block of the Dungarpur district of Southern Rajasthan, we met 16-year-old Manja* for the first time. Poking the ground with a stick she picked up on the way to where we sat to have a conversation, Manja tells us her story. The eldest of 4 siblings, Manja was 12 when her father’s failing health led him to quit the cycle of migration that sustained the household, and return home for good. Soon after, Manja dropped out of school and began seeking work. For 4 years now, Manja has been the sole earning member of her family, working on construction sites, farm-lands and MNREGA work sites. In the aftermath of the lockdown, work remains sporadic — barely enough to sustain her family, or repay the debts accumulated over the course of the months when she had no work. In the small village where Manja resides, her story is by no means unique. It is also not one that is told very often. 

In March, as the world woke up to a hundred thousand migrant workers crossing state boundaries on foot to get back home in the aftermath of a rapidly imposed lockdown, the mainstream media and the general public’s eyes and ears had suddenly turned to the plight of workers in the informal sector, who make up more than 85 percent of the total workforce of the country (NSS, 61st round). Despite this push into mainstream public discourses, several segments within this broader group of informal sector workers continue to remain largely invisible. One such identity is that of the adolescent female worker in the labour market — the kishori shramik.

Also read: What Happens When Women Informal Workers Devalue Their Own Work?

Kishori shramiks make for a significant proportion of the population in multiple districts falling within the tribal belt of Southern Rajasthan: a belt that also feeds the ravenous mouths of the labour markets of Ahmedabad, Surat, Mumbai and Bangalore. Encapsulated within stretches of fragmented farm lands and the dry and arid mountains of the Aravali range, are blocks and panchayats relying on migration to access job opportunities in the informal sector that bordering states like Gujarat offer. Other than certain stretches, such as the Kushalgarh block of Banswara district, where extreme water shortage during the summer months enforces a pattern of family migration, in most other districts and blocks in the region, migration is exclusively the domain of the man.

From the families left behind however, women and adolescent girls, largely excluded from the popular imagination of the identity of a labourer, typically enter the local labour market — an equally exploitative market that capitalises on the devaluation of women’s labour. 

This article explores the dynamics embedded in the kishori shramik’s interactions with the labour market, drawing on insights and findings gathered over the course of Aajeevika Bureau’s years of sustained work with this population within the tribal belt of Southern Rajasthan, as well as a research carried out by the organisation within the Salumbar block of Udaipur district, in the year 2017. 

The Adolescent Girl’s Entry into the Labour Market

The adolescent girl’s entry into the labour market and the forging of her new identity as a ‘kishori shramik’ is reinforced by a set of inter-connected factors, the most obvious amongst them — the need to add to the meagre income of the household. The realisation of this need often either precedes or follows the act of dropping out of school.

As a pattern, the former is largely visible within single mother households or households with stories like that of Manja’s – with an adult parent rendered unable to work due to health related challenges or more commonly, alcoholism.  

The latter, on the other hand, is often the case with adolescent girls entering the labour market between the ages of 13-15, the ages around which the lines on graphs mapping school drop out rates also become steeper. While the no fail policy keeps children enrolled in schools till the 8th grade, failure rates in subsequent grades (high due to the meagre quality of education up until then), correlates with the drop out rates. When a girl fails, families perceive little incentive to sending her back to school. Instead, putting her to work at the earliest, in markets where wages are often dependent on the number of years of experience, is the more sensible thing to do. Closely tied to this pattern, a reinforcer essentially, is the aspect of community-wide normalisation of adolescent girls at work. 

A factor slightly more difficult to perceive, is connected to a word that perhaps doesn’t find space within our single stories of child labour — the kishori shramik’s desire for agency. For many kishori shramiks in the region, going to work is an act that enables her to earn money of her own, spend it as she pleases (at least a portion of it), and also enter spaces that take her beyond the shackles of home. 

But how does the kishori shramik actually enter the labour market? Through literal labour markets, popularly known as a ‘naaka.’  At local naakas, those in search of work line up with hopes of getting hired by contractors. The naaka however, operates differently for adolescent girls. For the adolescent girl at the local naaka, the likelihood of finding work often rests on her relative attractiveness. For her male counterpart though, his skill, experience and bodily strength become key determining factors. 

Sites of Exploitation – The Kishori Shramik’s Work, Wages and Body 

For the kishori shramik, the work site is also the site of harassment and rampant exploitation. In the construction sector, one of the largest employers of kishori shramiks in the region, male and female labourers are addressed differently — the female worker is a ‘coolie,’ and the male worker a ‘beldaar’. While the terms may connote differences in the nature of work, this is rarely so, aside from the additional cleaning and serving tasks that are exclusively for women to do. Regardless, on an average, the kishori shramik’s male counterpart earns about 20-40% more than she does— a wage gap that makes the kishori shramik the more in-demand segment of the labour force. 

But few think to question this gap. For Manja, the difference of 50 rupees between her wage and that of her male counterpart is less of a problem than the complete non-payment of wages, a common form of exploitation at the hands of contractors and other middle men. 

In the Ghati panchayat of Salumbar block, located on the banks of the majestic Jaisamand lake that often devours surrounding farm lands during the months of rain, live Kamla*, Priya*, Ritu*, Tara* and Manju* – 16 and 17 year old kishori shramiks still awaiting the payment of over ten thousand rupees each, for work they did before the lockdown.

In a conversation, Tara tells us that she has since been hesitant to seek work, for fear of a similar experience repeating itself. 

For the kishori shramik at work, harassment and exploitation is by no means limited to the domain of wages, but also extends to her body. At work, the kishori shramik’s body is the site of gazes, non-consensual touching and groping and unwanted sexual advances. “Ekli kam umar ri mahila laare jyaada chhed-chhad ve, kyunki vana re lare koi aadmi bolva vaaro ni ve,” says Anita* (Translation – “Unmarried, young women are subjected to more harassment, since she has no man to speak for her”). Often perpetrated by contractors, harassment operates within a space of sharp power imbalances, leaving the kishori shramik with little ability to retaliate.

Also read: ‘You Don’t Behave Like A Muslim’: Being Muslim At The Workplace

Lockdown and the Labour Market 

For the kishori shramik, as for most others employed within the informal sector, the pandemic and the subsequent lockdown meant a sudden shut-down of worksites and a loss of all sources of income. With the inflow of a sizeable number of male migrant workers back into rural source regions, once local work sites opened up, demand and competition for the limited opportunities for work rose, leaving the kishori shramik with a labour market that had little space for her. Narratives collected from kishori shramiks following the lockdown indicate qualitative shifts in where the kishori shramik found work. Post lockdown, the kishori shramik who once easily found work at construction sites, only briefly found work in the farm lands of local landowning, upper caste farmers during the harvest season. 

The vulnerabilities of the kishori shramik’s household that pushed her into the labour market, have only inflated in the aftermath of the lockdown, with families pushed into extreme financial distress and consequent cycles of indebtedness. The kishori shramik’s entry into the labour market is the product of systemic failures in addressing these very vulnerabilities. The kishori shramik of today, more in need of work than ever before, stands on more shaky ground — with desperation making way for exploitation. 

*Names changed to maintain confidentiality.

About the study: 

The study explores the hidden world of Salumbar block’s rural construction industry, where adolescence in tribal girls intersects with informal labour market. The study touches upon many questions: What has triggered the labour market participation of these girls? What are the specific vulnerabilities faced by them? How do other actors in their context view them? How does the agency and sexuality of adolescent girls interact with labour market’s extractive tendencies? Through in—depth interviews with 26 workers and contractors, the study attempts to offer a peek into the world of these young daily commuters. 

Investigators: Vikas Pathak, Prema Dhurve, Parashram Lohar, Payal Gandhi, and Kamlesh Sharma 

The video link for the study presentation can be found here. For further reading on the study findings, please refer to the power point presentation, here. 

Sruthi Nair is a fellow from the 2020 cohort of India Fellow for Social Leadership Programme. As part of the fellowship, she’s currently working with Aajeevika Bureau, a non-profit based out of southern Rajasthan, offering legal aid, skill training and job placement services, and linkages to social security entitlements to migrant workers. In source areas, Aajeevika’s Family Empowerment Programme works towards empowering women in migration affected communities. The organisation is also host to a dedicated knowledge centre – Centre for Migration and Labour Solutions – for policy, research, and advocacy on issues of seasonal migration and informal work. You can reach the organisation on Twitter and Facebook.

Image Sources: All pictures as provided by Aajeevika Bureau.