Law and Social Justice

"Many of the people directly or indirectly involved in the production of a commodity, the weavers, the farmer, all face exploitation or an unfair situation in the market. To protect people from such exploitation, the government makes certain laws. These laws try to ensure that the unfair practices are kept at a minimum in the markets"

1.0Introduction

Let us take the issue of worker's wages. Many private companies, businesspersons, contractors, want to make as much profit as they can. Thus, at times, to earn more profits, workers are often denied their rights and not even paid wages. Thus, to address this issue, a law on minimum wages has been made where a worker has to be paid not less than the minimum wage by the employer. The minimum wages are revised upwards every few years.

As with the law on minimum wages, which is meant to protect workers, there are also laws that protect the interests of producers and consumers in the market.

These help ensure that the relations between these three parties - the worker, consumer and producer - are governed in a manner that is not exploitative.

• But merely making laws is not enough. The government has to ensure that these laws are implemented. This means that the law must be enforced. Enforcement becomes even more important when the law seeks to protect the weak from the strong. For instance, to ensure that every worker gets fair wages, the government has to regularly inspect work sites and punish those who violate the law.
• When workers are poor or powerless, the fear of losing future earnings or facing reprisals often forces them to accept low wages. Employers know this well and use their power to pay workers less than the fair wage. In such cases, it is crucial that laws are enforced.
• Through making, enforcing, and upholding these laws, the government can control the activities of individuals or private companies so as to ensure social justice. Many of these laws have their basis in the Fundamental Rights guaranteed by the Indian Constitution. For instance, the Right against Exploitation says that no one can be forced to work for low wages or under bondage.
• Similarly, the Constitution lays down "no child below the age of 14 years shall be employed to work in any factory or mines or engaged in any other hazardous employment."

2.0Laws that Prevent Exploitation

As seen earlier, people are being exploited at every turn of life. Workers are denied fair wages by their employers. Workers who need a job badly accept low wages and are exploited by the employers. The government has passed many laws to guarantee that workers are not exploited by unscrupulous employers. These laws protect the interest of farm labourers, construction workers, factory workers and domestic workers. It is the duty of factory owners to ensure the physical safety of all its employees. Many factories do not take adequate measures to ensure this.

Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986

According to the 2011 census, over 4 million children in India aged between 5 and 14 work in various occupations including hazardous ones. In 2016, Parliament amended the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986, banning the employment of children below the age of 14 years in all occupations and of adolescents (14-18 years) in hazardous occupations and processes. It made employing these children or adolescents a cognizable offence. Anyone found violating the ban must be penalized with a punishment ranging from a jail term of six months to two years and/or fine of to . The central government had asked state governments to develop plans to rescue and rehabilitate children who are working.

3.0Bhopal Gas Tragedy

• Union Carbide (UC) an American company had a factory in the city in which it produced pesticides. At midnight on 2 December 1984, methyl-isocyanides, a highly poisonous gas started leaking from the factory plant.
• Within three days, more than 8,000 people were dead. Hundreds of thousands were maimed.
• Most of those exposed to the poison gas came from poor, working-class families.
• There are nearly 50,000 people today who are too sick to work.
• Among those who survived, many developed severe respiratory disorders, eye problems and other disorders. Children developed peculiar abnormalities.
• The disaster was not an accident.
• UC had deliberately ignored the essential safety measures in order to cut costs.
• Much before the Bhopal disaster, there had been incidents of gas leak killing a worker and injuring several.
• Despite the overwhelming evidence pointing to UC as responsible for the disaster, it refused to accept responsibility.
• In the ensuing legal battle, the government represented the victims in a civil case against UC.
• It filed a 3$ 470$ million in 1989.
• Survivors appealed against the settlement but the Supreme Court ruled that the settlement amount would stand.
• UC stopped its operations, but left behind tons of toxic chemicals.
• These have seeped into the ground, contaminating water. Dow Chemical, the company who now owns the plant, refuses to take responsibility for clean up.
• 24 years later, people are still fighting for justice: for safe drinking water, for health-care facilities and jobs for the people poisoned by UC. They also demand that Anderson, the UC chairman who faces criminal charges, be prosecuted.

4.0What is a Worker's Worth?

• One reason why foreign companies come to India is for cheap labour. Wages that the companies pay to workers, say in the U.S.A., are far higher than what they have to pay to workers in poorer countries like India. For lower pay, companies can get longer hours of work. Additional expenses such as for housing facilities for workers are also fewer. Thus, companies can save costs and earn higher profits.
• Cost cutting can also be done by other more dangerous means. Lower working conditions including lower safety measures are used as ways of cutting costs. In the UC plant, every safety device was malfunctioning or was in short supply. Between 1980 and 1984, the work crew for the MIC plant was cut in half from 12 to 6 workers. The period of safety training for workers was brought down from 6 months to 15 days! The post of night-shift worker for the MIC plant was abolished.

Read the following comparison between UC's safety system in Bhopal and its other plant in the US:

At West Virginia (U.S.A.) computerised warning and monitoring systems were in place, whereas the UC plant in Bhopal relied on manual gauges and the human senses to detect gas leaks. At the West Virginia plant, emergency evacuation plans were in place, but non-existent in Bhopal.

Why are there sharp differences between in safety standards across countries?

• One part of the answer lies in what is perceived as the worth of an Indian worker. One worker can easily replace another Since there is so much unemployment, there are many workers who are willing to work in unsafe conditions in return for a wage.

Making use of the workers' vulnerability, employers ignore safety in workplaces. Thus, even so many years after the Bhopal gas tragedy, there are regular reports of accidents in construction sites, mines or factories due to the callous attitude of the employers.

5.0Enforcement of Safety Laws

The government, as the lawmaker and enforcer, is supposed to ensure that safety laws are implemented. It is also the duty of the government to ensure that the Right to Life guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution is not violated.

How the Bhopal tragedy occurred?

• Safety laws were lax in India.
• These weak safety laws were not enforced. Government officials refused to recognise the plant as hazardous and allowed it to come up in a populated locality.
• When some municipal officials in Bhopal objected that the installation of an MIC production unit in 1978 was a safety violation, the position of the government was that the state needs the continued investment of the Bhopal plant, which provides jobs.
• The government did not take the initiative to ask the Union Carbide Company to shift to cleaner technology or safer procedures.
• Government inspectors continued to approve the procedures in the plant, even when there were repeated incidents of poisonous gas leaks. The above facts reveal that the government instead of protecting the interests of the people was acting in favour of the Company. The worker's safety was disregarded both by the government and by the company.

As more industries are being set up both by local and foreign businessmen in India, there is a great need for stronger laws to protect workers' rights and for better enforcement of these laws.

6.0New Laws to Protect the Environment

In 1984, there were very few laws protecting the environment in India, and the there was hardly any enforcement of these laws. The environment was treated as a 'free' entity and any industry could pollute the air and water without any restrictions. Whether it was our rivers, air, groundwater - the environment was being polluted and the health of people disregarded. Thus, not only was UC a beneficiary of lower safety standards, it didn't have to spend any money to clean up the pollution. In the U.S.A., this is a necessary part of the production process.

The Bhopal disaster brought the issue of environmental pollution into focus. The general public who was not working in the factory were also affected by the poisonous gas that leaked from the factory. The existing laws did not protect the common man from industrial disasters. Environmental activists insisted on new laws which will protect all the citizens from hazardous pollution of the environment. In response to the demand by the activists and the public, the government introduced new laws on the environmental safety.

7.0New laws Imposed by the Government

• In response to this pressure from environmental activists and others, in the years following the Bhopal gas tragedy, the Indian government introduced new laws on the environment. Henceforth, the polluter was to be held accountable for the damage done to environment. The environment is something that people over generations will share, and it could not be destroyed merely for industrial development.
• The courts also gave a number of judgments upholding the right to a healthy environment as intrinsic to the Fundamental Right to Life. In Subhash Kumar vs. State of Bihar (1991), the Supreme Court held that the Right to Life is a Fundamental Right under Article 21 of the Constitution, and it includes the right to the enjoyment of pollution-free water and air for full enjoyment of life.
• The government is responsible for setting up laws and procedures that can check pollution, clean rivers and introduce heavy fines for those who pollute.

• Anti-smog initiatives increase as Delhi battles pollution

8.0Environment as a Public Facility

• In recent years, while the courts have come out with strong orders on environmental issues, these have sometimes affected people's livelihoods adversely.
• For instance, the courts directed industries in residential areas in Delhi to close down or shift out of the city. Several of these industries were polluting the neighbourhood and discharge from these industries was polluting the river Yamuna, because they had been set up without following the rules.

• But, while the court's action solved one problem, it created another. Because of the closure, many workers lost their jobs. Others were forced to go to far-away places where these factories had relocated. And the same problem now began to come up in these areas - for now these places became polluted. And the issue of the safety conditions of workers remained unaddressed.
• Recent research on environmental issues in India has highlighted the fact that the growing concern for the environment among the middle classes is often at the expense of the poor. So, for example, slums need to be cleaned as part of a city's beautification drive, or as in the case above, a polluting factory is moved to the outskirts of the city. And while this awareness of the need for a clean environment is increasing, there is little concern for the safety of the workers themselves.
• The challenge is to look for solutions where everyone can benefit from a clean environment. One way this can be done is to gradually move to cleaner technologies and processes in factories. The government has to encourage and support factories to do this. It will need to fine those who pollute. This will ensure that the workers livelihoods are protected and both workers and communities living around the factories enjoy a safe environment.

9.0Conclusion

• Laws are necessary in many situations, whether this be the market, office or factory so as to protect people from unfair practices. Private companies, contractors, businesspersons, to make higher profits, resort to unfair practices such as paying workers low wages, employing children for work, ignoring the conditions of work, ignoring the damage to the environment (and hence to the people in the neighbourhood) etc.
• A major role of the government, therefore, is to control the activities of private companies by making, enforcing and upholding laws so as to prevent unfair practices and ensure social justice. This means that the government has to make 'appropriate laws' and also has to enforce the laws.
• Laws that are weak and poorly enforced can cause serious harm, as the Bhopal gas tragedy showed. While the government has a leading role in this respect, people can exert pressure so that both private companies and the government act in the interests of society.
• Environment, as we saw, is one example where people have pushed a public cause and the courts have upheld the right to healthy environment as intrinsic to the Right to Life.
• Workers' rights (right to work, right to a fair wage and decent work conditions) is an area where the situation is still very unfair. People must demand stronger laws protecting workers' interests so that the Right to Life is achieved for all.

10.0Glossary

1. Minimum wages - The amount of wages below which no worker can be paid is termed as minimum wages. The government fixes this wage every year keeping in view the cost of living index.
2. Consumer - An individual who buys goods for personal use and not for resale.
3. Producer - A person or organisation that produces goods for sale in the market.
4. Pollution - When the air, water and environment gets contaminated by harmful gases and other toxic components, thereby becoming dangerous for human use, it is called pollution.

11.0Mind Map

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