About 78 per cent of the garment workers suffer from intense pressure to achieve targets daily and about 17.5 per cent of them experience verbal or sexual abuse at work. This was revealed by a sample survey conducted by Dr Y Narayana Chetty, professor and director, Alampalli Sri Venkataram chair on labour research, Bangalore University.
Of the 788 garment manufacturing units in Karnataka, 729 are in Bangalore. Of the 1,53,978 garment workers in the state, 1,10,019 are women. Around 93.65 per cent of these women work in the garment units based out of the city.
Releasing the survey report at a function here on Friday, Dr Chetty, who conducted the survey on a sample of 2,000 garment workers, said that women outnumber men in garment industry with 72.8 per cent.
“The workforce is predominantly of peasant background with very small land holdings,” he added.
According to the findings of the report, a shocking 51.4 per cent of the workers are denied compensation for sick leaves. While 73 per cent of the workers confessed that they face difficulties at work, women, especially were found to be subjected to harsh treatment in the nature of allotment of work and distribution of incentives.
Speaking at the release, Labour Minister B N Bacche Gowda said that there is a steep fall in the growth of the manufacturing sectors in the State.
“There is a dip in the demand for silk and cotton. It is deplorable, considering that India has competitors like Bangladesh, China and Indonesia,” said Gowda.
He lamented that there is a lack of social security for the garment workforce. “There is no awareness imparted to these people about their own basic rights. This is clear exploitation especially of the unorganised sector which constitutes 92 per cent of the workforce. They are totally deprived,” he said.