[30th July 2026] The Hindu OpED: India’s refusal to uphold a global gig work law

Mentor’s Comment

On June 12, the International Labour Conference adopted Convention No. 193 on Decent Work in the Platform Economy by a vote of 406 to 8. India’s government delegate abstained even as India’s own employer and worker delegates voted in favour. The abstention exposes a gap between India’s stated commitment to gig worker welfare through its domestic Labour Codes and its long-standing refusal to accept binding international obligations that courts could enforce.

What floor of rights does Convention No. 193 set that Indian law currently denies gig workers?

1. Rights regardless of classification: The Convention extends minimum pay, on-time payment, occupational safety and social security to platform workers whatever a company calls them, whether “employee” or “independent partner.”
2. Algorithmic management disclosure: Platforms must disclose significant automated decisions in writing and keep a human in the loop. Algorithmic management: the software that allocates work, sets pay, monitors performance and can deactivate accounts. No prior global labour standard has regulated this domain.
3. Correct classification mandate: Article 9 requires governments to classify workers by the facts of the work performed, not by the label a platform assigns.
4. Enforceability through ratification: A worker in a ratifying country can sue a platform for redress once the Convention is written into domestic law. India’s abstention forecloses that route.
5. Limited but real floor: The Convention does not resolve every gig work dispute. It sets a minimum below which no ratifying country can fall.

How large and precarious is India’s gig workforce today?

1. Scale: India’s gig workforce stood at roughly 7.7 million in 2020-21. NITI Aayog projects it will reach 2.35 crore by 2029-30, about 6.7% of the non-agricultural workforce.
2. Wage distribution: About 39% of gig workers earn ₹10,000-₹25,000 a month. Another 34% earn ₹25,000-₹40,000.
3. Unpaid costs: Workers cover fuel costs themselves and work 12-hour shifts with no overtime. Overtime requires an employer to exist in law.
4. Social security gap: Only about 15% of gig workers have any social security cover.
5. Algorithmic exposure: An algorithm can deactivate a worker’s account and cut off income without explanation. Workers have no accident cover, sick pay or pension to fall back on.

Does India’s Code on Social Security, 2020 already deliver what Convention No. 193 promises?

1. Early definitional step: The Code on Social Security, part of the four Labour Codes in force from November 2025, was among the world’s first central laws to define “gig worker” and “platform worker.”
2. Funding mechanism on paper: Aggregators must pay 1%-2% of annual turnover, capped at 5% of worker payouts, into a social security fund.
3. Unspecified benefits: Neither the central law nor most state laws specify the nature, quantum or eligibility of benefits.
4. Un-operationalised contribution: The contribution mechanism remains largely unimplemented. The schemes remain notional.
5. Gap between claim and delivery: The law reads as leadership on paper. It functions as a promise that has not been converted into disbursed protection.

Who is actually legislating gig worker protection: the Centre or the states?

1. Rajasthan’s model: The Rajasthan Platform-Based Gig Workers Act, 2023 is a standalone state law establishing gig worker registration and welfare mechanisms.
2. Karnataka and Telangana boards: Both states have drafted welfare boards for platform workers independent of central action.
3. Federalism argument tested: The Centre cites labour as a concurrent subject to justify caution. States are already exercising that same concurrent jurisdiction.
4. Centre-state asymmetry: The Centre abstains in Geneva while states legislate at home. This reverses the usual expectation that national commitments lead subnational implementation.

Is India’s abstention a one-off caution or a settled institutional posture?

1. Founding member, selective ratifier: India is a founding member of the ILO and has ratified six of eight core conventions. It has not ratified Convention 87 on Freedom of Association or Convention 98 on the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining.
2. Domestic rule conflict: India has not ratified Conventions 87 and 98 because they would grant government servants the right to strike. Domestic rules bar that right.
3. Violence and harassment convention untouched: India has also not ratified Convention 190 on violence and harassment at work.
4. Reversed sequence: India ratifies conventions only once domestic law is already in full conformity. This reverses the sequence in which ratification typically drives domestic reform.
5. A settled choice: A founding member of the ILO that will not sign the ILO’s own guarantees is not acting out of unfamiliarity. It is exercising a settled choice to endorse principles without accepting enforceable obligations.

What does the abstention cost gig workers and India’s global standing?

1. Lost legal recourse: Ratification would let a worker sue a platform for redress. Abstention forecloses that possibility inside India.
2. Signal to aggregators: The abstention tells every aggregator operating in India that calling workers “partners” rather than employees remains a safe classification.
3. Cross-country disparity: A delivery worker in China will have enforceable rights under the Convention. A worker in Chennai will not.
4. A choice by default: The government chose neither the worker nor the platform in a forum where one side holds the app and the other holds the handlebars. That default functions as choosing the platform.
5. Scale of the stake: The World Bank estimates 154-435 million people already earn through platforms worldwide. 2.35 crore of them will be Indian by 2030.

Conclusion

India’s abstention on Convention No. 193 is not an isolated diplomatic caution. It follows the same pattern as its non-ratification of Conventions 87, 98 and 190: endorse the principle in domestic law, withhold the obligation that would make it enforceable. Gig workers are left with a social security fund that exists on paper but not in disbursement, while individual states legislate protections the Centre will not commit to nationally. Until India converts stated intent into binding law, its 2.35 crore gig workers by 2030 will remain outside the floor of rights their counterparts elsewhere now hold.