Recently, Karnataka released the Karnataka Platform-based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Bill, 2024, inviting public suggestions. If passed, this would make Karnataka the second Indian state, after Rajasthan, with legislation for gig workers. 

About Gig Economy

• Refers: A gig economy is a labor market that relies on independent contractors and freelancers rather than full-time permanent employees.
• Includes: In recent years, the global job market has witnessed a transformative shift with the rise of ‘gigification’ or adoption of the gig model – reshaping how we work. They include the following:
  • freelancers who get paid per task;
  • independent contractors who perform work and get paid on a contract-to-contract basis;
  • project-based workers who get paid by the project;
  • temporary hires who are employed for a fixed amount of time; and
  • part-time workers who work less than full-time hours.
• Classification of Gig Economy:
  • Platform-Based: They use online apps or digital platforms to find and perform work, such as ride-hailing, food delivery, e-commerce, online freelancing, etc. 
  • Non-platform-based gig workers: They work outside the traditional employer-employee relationship, such as casual wage workers and own-account workers in sectors like construction, domestic work, agriculture, etc.
• Challenges: 
  • Blocking Access to Service: The platform companies, often and arbitrarily terminate their access to the platform in effect terminating their jobs. 
    • Since these companies refuse to acknowledge they are employers, this is framed as blocking access to a service. 
  • Opaqueness: Currently, gig workers have a completely opaque relationship with the platforms, which monitor the actions of the workers and do not even divulge on what metrics adverse actions are taken. 
    • This provision thus reduces the potential for algorithmic wage discrimination, workplace harassment, etc.
  • Nature of Relation: It is argued that platform-based gig work, especially in ride-hailing platforms, is employment and the platforms are not intermediaries or markets but employers. 
    • Netherlands acknowledges that the drivers and platforms have a “modern employer-employee relationship” while UK and Spain consider associates “workers” but have not stated that the employer is the platform. 

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Significant Provisions of the Karnataka Platform-based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Bill, 2024

• Clear Definition: It does provide a clearer definition of gig workers and creates mechanisms for a formal contract between platform companies and workers.
  • While continuing to refer to platform companies as “intermediaries”. 
  • This potentially provides an enabling framework to bring platform-based gig work into the regulatory ambit of labor.
    • The Rajasthan law neither considers the platform worker an employee nor the platform the employer but declares a separate category called “gig work”, which it does not define. 
• For Termination: The Karnataka bill mandates that companies provide notice of termination, with a valid reason, 14 days in advance. 
  • It is affirming that what the platforms provide is not a mere service that can be arbitrarily withdrawn.
• On Access to Information: The Karnataka bill empowers gig workers to request access to information about work, ratings and personal data.
  • However, in Rajasthan legislation, algorithmic transparency can be sought only by the state and the welfare board.
• Creation of Grievance Redressal Mechanism: It also creates a grievance redressal mechanism for gig workers.
• On Compensation: It mandates that gig workers must be compensated on at least a weekly basis. 
• Use of Labour Laws: It also states that gig workers have the right to raise disputes through the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, and therefore to make use of existing Indian labor laws and potentially bring them out of the regulatory lacuna.
• Expansion Role of Welfare Board: It includes open consultation with gig worker associations and empowers the board to make social security schemes for women and people with disabilities. 
  • Thus, it accepts the socialized nature of platform-based gig work instead of an atomised transaction between a service provider and an “associate”, hopefully enabling further future deliberations on the impact of platformization on society. 

Challenges that Need to be Tackled

• Not Extensive Details: The exact details of what this contract will look like and what aspects of state and central labor laws will apply to it remain unanswered. 
• Termination Conditions: Since the details of the contract will be worked out when the rules are created, at this stage, it is difficult to ascertain to what extent the legislation will be able to prevent unfair terminations. 
• On Grievance Redressal Mechanism: Grievances can only be raised about provisions of the draft bill and thereby stop short of providing gig workers the ability to file grievances about the amount of compensation provided or other forms of exploitation at the hands of companies and customers that are not explicitly covered by the bill.

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Conclusion

The draft bill brings collective bargaining for gig workers back on the agenda and reflects the impact of the growing strength of gig worker unions in India. For platform-based gig workers, this draft is a promising development, though the recognition of gig work as employment remains to be won. 

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