A Bhopal a month

Accidents at workplaces and occupational diseases, together with other work-related factors, claim tens of thousands of lives in India, but this fact has not received sufficient official attention.

STIRLING SMITH

IF a new illness was discovered in India killing someone every five minutes - and that too people in their prime, people active economically - there would be an immediate reaction. There would be conferences and research grants; foreign donors would field missions and offer funding. If there was a non-governmental organisation that could reduce by half the annual toll of this new disease, money would be pumped into its projects.

There is such a "disease": work. Work kills an Indian every five minutes, the equivalent of a Bhopal every month. Accidents and diseases caused by work can be prevented in the same way as cholera or typhoid. The measures are well known and in many cases inexpensive. But neither governments nor aid agencies are the least bit interested. This series of articles will examine why. In this first article, we would look at the evidence.

More than one lakh workers are killed every year. This figure will not be found in any official publication. Indian Labour Statistics 1994 lists the following fatalities for 1993:

The Ministry of Labour only provides statistics for four industries. There are in fact only four Central Acts that refer to the safety of employees - the Factories Act, 1948, for factories and workshops; the Mines Act, 1952, for mines and, in theory, stone mines or quarries; the Dock Workers (Safety, Health and Welfare) Act, 1986, for ports; and the Building and Other Construction Workers (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996, for the construction industry. The construction workers' legislation is not yet operational and there are no figures available. There is no statutory reporting requirement for the Railways, although the Railway Board collects statistics.

These figures are incomplete even for the industries that are covered. But there is a much greater loss of life in those sectors where there is no legislation and therefore no requirement to report workplace accidents.

How can we work out accident rates if there are no statistics? The only method available is: look at the accident rates in the United Kingdom and the rest of the European Union (E.U.)and extrapolate these to the Indian situation. The methodology used is quite simple:

* Incidence rates for an industry are taken from the U.K. or E.U. figures. Incidence rates are usually expressed as the number of fatal or serious accidents per 100,000 workers.

* The incidence rate is then applied to the known or estimated numbers of persons working in an industry in India.

* A multiplier is then applied. The source for the multiplier is the World Bank. It has pointed out that work is more risk-prone in developing countries. For example, a factory worker in Pakistan is eight times more likely to be killed at work than a factory worker in France; fatalities among transport workers are 10 times in Kenya what they are in Denmark; and construction workers in Guatemala are six times more likely to die at work than their counterparts in Switzerland.

To be cautious, we have applied a multiplier of only four. The use of incidence rates in this way underestimates the problem, as it takes no account of the number of hours worked. Workers in the E.U. countries generally work less than 40 hours a week; in India, the real working week, particularly in the unorganised sector, is much longer.

Let us now examine a number of industries in turn.

Railways

A huge amount of attention has been paid recently to the Indian Railways' very poor safety record. There have been some horrific accidents. The Railway Board usually seeks to blame these accidents on "human error" and lack of a proper work culture. In fact, the Railways have been starved of essential safety spending for years. In 1996, a Standing Committee of the Lok Sabha severely criticised the Railway Ministry for "lack of safety consciousness", a failure to plan for modern signalling devices and "ad hocism" in investing for safety.

In August 1995, there was an accident in Firozabad, Uttar Pradesh, which killed 310 people. India has an excellent, independent system to investigate railway accidents. Commissioners for Railway Safety report to the Civil Aviation Ministry, not the Railway Ministry - an arrangement designed to guarantee their independence. The report on the Firozabad accident revealed that the signalman held mainly responsible for it - a case of "human error" - was known to be under- qualified, under-trained and not properly supervised. It was a management failure to allow such a person to work in a safety-critical job. In addition, the railway administration had ignored reports dating back to 1970 to provide track circuiting on sections of the type where that accident took place - a "failsafe" technology, which can override human error. The report also found that the Indian Railways' safety organisation lacked real authority and staff-prioritised operations for safety.

That is the situation regarding passenger safety. That concerning workers' safety is much worse. There is no specific legislation covering workers' safety and health in the Indian Railways. The Railways Act, 1989, makes no mention of the subject. The excellent Commissioners of Railway Safety have no duties or powers concerning workers' safety and health.

It is found that in Britain, in the late 1980s, before the railway system was restructured and privatised, up to 14 workers per 1,00,000 persons employed were killed annually. The inspectorate also identified nearly 300 major injury casualties every year. There was a particular problem with the staff employed by contractors. Given that the Indian Railways employ far more people and constitute a much bigger system, it can be estimated that at least 250 railway workers, including contractors' workers, are killed at work every year in India. If the World Bank multiplier is applied, the figure would be 1,000.

The position in other sectors of the transport industry may be worse. In the U.K., the RoSPA (Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents) has reckoned that up to one-third of road traffic fatalities should be categorised as occupational - that is of workers, while travelling by road in connection with their work.

Actual figures for the number of people killed on India's roads are not available, although 70,000 deaths a year is thought to be the lower end of the estimates. Even if only 10 per cent of them are occupational in nature, they would account for 7,000 work-related deaths that do not appear in the Ministry of Labour's statistics.

Building sites or slaughterhouses?

India is estimated to have about two crores of construction workers. In the U.K., the average incidence rate (that is the number of construction workers killed per 1,00,000 workers) is 7.92. Translate to India, and this would give us a figure of 1,584. To apply the multiplier would produce a figure of 6,336. The main hazards are objects falling on workers and workers themselves falling from a height.

There is now a Central law regulating the construction industry, which includes provision for safety and health. The task of enforcement lies with the States. They are supposed to make rules and collect reports of accidents. So far little action has been taken in this regard. No statistics are available under the Act as yet.

Agricultural workers

There is no legislation dealing with health and safety in agriculture in India. No statistics are collected. In the E.U., the fatality rate in agricultural work is 14 deaths per one lakh workers annually. Translate that to India, we get a figure of 26,740 (according to the 1991 Census, 191 million workers are engaged in cultivation). Assuming an accident rate in India of four times the European average, the World Bank multiplier, we get a figure of 1,06,960 people engaged in agriculture killed every year.

It might be argued that agriculture in India is "low-tech" and that accidents in the E.U. are mainly caused by machinery. This hypothesis would be worth examining - any research into safety in India would be welcome - but there is widespread use of tractors, threshing machines and so on in India. The greatest hazard in agricultural work, however, is pesticides.

The Ministry of Labour, in a paper prepared for the 37th Standing Committee on Labour (February 14, 2001), has observed: "Agricultural workers in India are more vulnerable to health and safety hazards as compared to those in countries such as China and Japan because here a large section of them constitute a distinct socially oppressed strata subject to bonded labour, child labour and caste discrimination.... workers, being unorganised and with little or no legal protection, are usually at the receiving end."

Factories

The Factories Act only applies to premises using power and employing more than 10 persons or employing more than 20 persons and using no power. A very large number of workshops, therefore, are not covered by the Act, which is enforced by the States.

Many premises that should register themselves under the Factories Act do not do so. Also premises are used for activities for which they are unsuitable. On May 31, 1999, for example, 48 persons were killed in an explosion in an Old Delhi godown, which had no licence to store chemicals. Many of those killed were not working in the godown; they just happened to be nearby.

Even on registered premises, conditions can at best be described as appalling. The Indian Express reported that only one in four of the workers of slate pencil factories in Sultanpura, Madhya Pradesh, survived working there. Working in sheds, they slice slate to make pencils. This creates silica dust, which causes silicosis.

There are a number of factors that can be applied to estimate the number of urban workers of workshops and other workplaces not covered by the Factories Act, who are killed at work. These are: the huge size of the small-scale sector; the fact that small-scale workplaces have a higher accident rate than large workplaces; and the problem of under-reporting.

Taking all these factors into account, a conservative estimate of the number of workers killed in factories and workshops, including premises that are covered by and excluded from the purview of the Factories Act, would be 5,000 a year.

Some States have declared a moratorium on the inspection of factories, in the name of ending "inspector raj" and promoting a business-friendly environment.

Ship-breaking

This industry, in which old ships are brought to be broken up is concentrated in Gujarat. This used to be a fairly "high-tech" industry in developed countries. It has now shifted to South Asia and China, where labour costs are low and ships are broken up manually. Forty thousand persons are estimated to be employed at Alang, the largest ship-breaking yard in Gujarat.

No statistics are kept of the deaths at Alang. One study of health and environment there mentions a single accident in 1996-97 in which 50 people died. Guesses range from a minimum of 40 workers killed every year to much higher figures.

This may well be the most hazardous occupation in the country. Toxic substances such as asbestos and polyvinyl chlorides are released into the water, air and land. A German expert has calculated the risk of workers there contracting cancer to be in the order of 25 per cent. The Indian average is 7-11 per cent in the metros.

A Bhopal a month?

We can now make an estimate of the number of workers killed in accidents at work every year in India. In every case, I have rounded down or taken the lower figure from a range.

There were about 8,000 acute fatalities in Bhopal, although more people die every year from the effects of the gas leak. So the equivalent of one Bhopal tragedy takes place every month in India. Even this estimate is on the conservative side.

Occupational diseases

However, to the number of deaths caused by accidents, one must add the number of those who die of occupational diseases. Occupational diseases are defined as diseases caused by work, usually from exposure to dusts, chemicals or physical processes such as noise. They cannot be cured.

There is immense difficulty even in developed countries in identifying the causes of a disease. Very few illnesses have an exclusively occupational cause. Lung cancer can be caused by smoking, but it can also be caused by dust or a toxic chemical. The British Trades Union Congress estimates that one in five, that is, 4,00,000, adults who suffer from asthma have the condition as a result of their work.

A very substantial percentage of current health problems in India are occupational in origin, but this is not recognised.

The only figures available are those dealing with compensation paid for prescribed industrial diseases. The procedures for diagnosing these are not well known and take a long time. Although byssinosis (caused by an allergic reaction in the lungs to cotton dust) has been a prescribed disease for decades, it is only in the last few years, as a result of sustained pressure from union activists, that a small number of workers in Mumbai have finally started receiving state benefits.

In 1995-96 there were 338 reported deaths caused by accidents in the U.K. and 7,500 deaths attributed to occupational disease. That gives a ratio of 338 workplace deaths: 7,500 deaths caused by occupational diseases, expressed as 338:7500 or 22 deaths from occupational diseases for every death by occupational accident.

If this ratio is applied to India, we would get 1,00,000: 22,00,000. Twenty-two lakhs every year - deaths from heart failure, cancer and other diseases caused by work. This is very likely to be an underestimate.

A health time bomb

If we look at the conditions prevailing in factories, it is not difficult to see why workers contract occupational diseases.

In a survey was conducted in West Bengal by the Department of Labour, a total of 71 samples were taken from factories to see if proper levels for chemicals, noise, heat, dust, lighting and solvents (for fire or explosion risk) were maintained. Of these samples, only in six cases the levels were within permissible limits. In terms of heat, lighting and noise, not a single sample was within the statutory limits. It should be borne in mind that the standards laid down in the Factories Act are much lower than those recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) or the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

This survey draws attention to the health time bomb that is ticking away in nearly every factory in India - workers are being poisoned, deafened and subjected to high levels of toxic exposure, and their eyesight is being damaged. Employers are externalising the costs of health. Ultimately the public health system or, more likely the workers and their families, will pay the price. In Vadodara (Baroda), workers went on strike against poor health and safety conditions in June 1999. Forty-three workers of a chemical plant were found to have nasal septum perforation - a classic early sign of chromium poisoning. It was reported that all workers had not yet had a full medical examination, so there could be more cases. The only thing unusual about this case was that it came to light and received publicity.

Pesticides

India has a very high level of pesticide use, and the quantum of pesticide residues found in many common foods and in water are much more than the permissible limits set by the WHO. While there has been, quite rightly, considerable concern about the implications of the presence of pesticides in water and food for public health, these pesticides are applied by rural workers. Fifty-four per cent by weight of the pesticides used in agriculture in India in 1994-95 consisted of substances that are banned or highly restricted in Western countries. The Voluntary Health Association of India has estimated that 20,000 people die every year of pesticide poisoning, although not all these cases would be occupational deaths. Pesticides are frequently used to commit suicide.

Asbestos

There are no controls in India over use of asbestos. Professor Julian Peto, a U.K. epidemiologist, has estimated that 5,00,000 people will die of cancers caused by asbestos in Western Europe in the next 35 years. Anti-asbestos campaigners point out that Prof. Peto's projections have been consistently lower than the actual outcomes and the true figure may be 7,50,000 - 10,00,000.

Given the complete lack of controls in India and the very widespread use of asbestos, there could well be a comparable number of deaths. Very few of these will be ascribed to asbestos, and they will be blamed on smoking or tuberculosis.(TB)

Large numbers of workers die painful and avoidable deaths. The government and the majority of employers wilfully neglect the problem.

REFERENCES

Indian Labour Statistics 1994, Labour Bureau, Shimla, 1996. The Building and Other Construction Workers (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996. Labour in West Bengal 1995, Government of West Bengal. Homicide by Pesticides, Centre for Science and the Environment, New Delhi, 1997. World Development Report, 1995.

Stirling Smith, an expert on labour health, is associated with the Labour and Society International (LSI), London.