Karnataka - Bangalore   

Hemmed in by odds, they toil away

Gowramma: Managements often deny garment workers their right to organise themselves.

BANGALORE: They put in long and gruelling hours in arduous and backbreaking work, commuting long distances from their homes to their workplaces. Their jobs are uncertain, wages low, and other workplace benefits inadequate.

These are the over five lakh garment workers who toil everyday in over 5,000 garment factories in and around the city. Over 99 per cent of these workers are women. Denied the most basic of benefits, including minimum wages, overtime pay, employee state insurance and provident fund, garment workers are an unseen but a sizeable section of the female workforce in the city.

Gowramma, district secretary of Janawadi Mahila Sanghatane in Bangalore, who has been striving to organise garment workers, said that the garment factory owners/ management often deny the workers their right to organise themselves and form a union. “There have been scores of instances when the managements have threatened these women against joining unions. Some have even resorted to threatening the leaders and workers by involving certain anti-social elements,” she said.

She said that garment workers work in unsafe conditions. “Sexual harassment is rampant in the garment industry. This makes it all the more important for garment workers to organise themselves,” she added.

Most factories do not have canteens and the workers can be seen having food, sitting by the side of the road outside their factories during lunch time. Garment workers face a lot of hardship at work. If they come in to work even 10 minutes late for two days a month, the management will cut one day's salary, she said.

“Workers have to finish the target set everyday. Else, they are forced to work overtime without any benefits. What is worse is that even the use of restroom is restricted for these women, including pregnant women. Even though they put in so much effort, thousands of garment workers still get a raw deal,” she added.

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