Adivasi women temporary workers in tea gardens and the Covid-19 pandemic

• Date: 15 September 2023
• Pages: 211-229
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/EDI-12-2022-0333
• Published date: 15 September 2023
• Author: Poonam Barhoi,Surbhi Dayal

Adivasi women temporary

workers in tea gardens

and the Covid-19 pandemic

Poonam Barhoi

Department of OB and HRM, Indian Institute of Management Indore,

Indore, India, and

Surbhi Dayal

Department of Humanities and Social Sciences,

Indian Institute of Management Indore, Indore, India

Abstract

Purpose –The tea plantation industry is characterized by the large-scale deployment of cheap women

laborers and gender-blind practices that makethe social positions of women workers vulnerable. This paper

considers women temporary workers in tea gardens to study the exacerbated impact of Covid-19 on their

lives. The impact of the pandemic on marginal tea garden women laborers has not received enough attention

from researchers; hence, the authors have studied the gendered implications of the pandemic on Adivasi

temporarywomenworkersinteagardensinIndia.“Adivasi”is an umbrella term to refer to all indigenous

tribes in India.

Design/methodology/approach –The authors conducted a qualitative study with 26 in-depth interviews

with women temporary workers who identify themselves as Adivasis. For the discussion, the authors have

mainly borrowed from intersectionality and subalternity literature.

Findings –The analysis explored the intersectional experiences of the women temporary workers (1) as

members of Tea Tribes who are compelled to continue working at tea gardens as wage laborers, (2) job

insecurities at work due to their temporary worker status, (3) disadvantages faced by women workers for their

gender identity and (4) the gendered impact of the pandemic on their lives.

Originality/value –This study has explored the gendered impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the lives of

temporary women workers who belong to ethnic minority groups in the global south. The exploitation of labor

rights in the tea industry during the pandemic has not been discussed enough by researchers earlier.

Keywords Adivasi women, Covid-19, Intersectionality, Subaltern, Temporary worker

Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction

Crises disproportionately impact different social groups. Whereas the impact of the pandemic

has been observed negatively in Global South nations (Carmody et al., 2020;Ozkazanc-Pan

and Pullen, 2020;Rasul et al., 2021), in India, where complex stratification of caste and class

are prevalent, the lives of marginalized people are even more vulnerable (Chaudhuri, 2021;

Haq et al., 2020;Nimble, 2021;Thomas et al., 2022). Further, because of the informal and

insecure nature of work in the Global South economy, the pandemic has had a negative

impact on the labor market (Hammer and Ness, 2021;Rasul et al., 2021). While the economic

recession and the sudden unemployment affected workers in the unorganized sector in many

undesirable ways and resulted in an increase in their economic, social and psychological

vulnerabilities (Agoramoorthy and Hsu, 2020;Ghosh, 2020;Chakraborty, 2020), the

helplessness of marginalized workers increased with the amplified risk of labor

exploitation with more time of engagement at work where they received negligible pay

(Deshingkar, 2022;Estupinan and Sharma, 2020;Khanna, 2020).

Women

workers in tea

gardens

211

Declaration: There is no potential conflict of interest in this paper.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:

https://www.emerald.com/insight/2040-7149.htm

Received 2 December 2022

Revised 4 June 2023

31 July 2023

Accepted 25 August 2023

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion:

An International Journal

Vol. 43 No. 2, 2024

pp. 211-229

© Emerald Publishing Limited

2040-7149

DOI 10.1108/EDI-12-2022-0333

The adverse effect of the pandemic is amplified when it intersects with unprivileged

identities, such as gender, class and caste. Few studies have found that the impact of Covid-19

on employment losses and food security is significantly greater for women, Muslims, Tribal

and Dalits (Agoramoorthy and Hsu, 2020;Deshpande and Ramachandran, 2020;Kesar et al.,

2021). Apart from employment losses, people from marginalized castes have faced increased

discrimination during the pandemic (Deshpande, 2021). Further, the pandemic has intensified

the vulnerability of women being subject to loss of livelihood and risk of violence (Debata

et al., 2020;Malathesh et al., 2020). In light of this, this research examines the amplified effects

of Covid-19 on temporary women workers in tea gardens. Nearly 82% of women workers in

India are concentrated in the informal economy (ILO, 2018); however, the impact of the

pandemic on women workers in the informal economy has not received enough attention

from researchers. Hence, we have studied the gendered impact of the pandemic on women

temporary workers in tea gardens in India (Assam) who also belong to ethnic minority

groups.

The tea plantation workers in Assam have a history of facing oppression since the time of

British colonial rule. In the mid-eighties, when Britishers brought laborers from different

parts of the country for tea plantation work, many people came to Assam leaving their home

states (Duara and Mallick, 2012;Mishra et al., 2011). While the Britishers promised them to

provide better livelihood, the migration resulted in loss of their original identity and

transformed them into bonded laborers (Chattopadhyay, 1988). The tea garden workers in

Assam are known as Tea Tribes [1] and Adivasi [2]; however, they are not recognized as

Scheduled Tribes [3] by the Indian constitution (Dasgupta, 2018). The term “Adivasi”,

meaning original inhabitants, was first used in a political context in 1938, when the Adivasi

Sabha in Jharkhand claimed a long history of insurgency against colonial rule (Dasgupta,

2018). Adivasis identify themselves as part of a larger community regardless of whether a

group is listed as a Scheduled Tribe or not. Tribal communities are confined to the Fifth

Schedule areas in eastern, central, western and southern India; however, those living in the

northeastern states (including Assam) are governed by the Sixth Schedule. Adivasis who

worked at British tea plantations in Assam are not listed as Scheduled Tribes in the Sixth

Schedule (Ananthanarayanan, 2010).

Whileall Tea Tribes struggle to get Scheduled Tribes recognitionand face ignorance by the

local Assamesepeople, government and tea-producingcompanies, the most vulnerable section

among them are the temporaryworkers. The temporary workers in tea gardensin Assam are

known as “faltu”workers.The meaning of “faltu”is useless in Assamese and Hindi languages.

The “faltu”term is usedto refer to the temporary workers both by management and workers.

They are regarded as “faltu”despite the fact that they comprise almost half of the total

workforce in the state across 765tea gardens and contribute the majority share in plantation-

related work. They generally work for six months a year, especially during the plucking

seasons. According to the Tea Board’s 2015 baseline survey, 41.52% of all laborers in tea

gardens are temporary(284,302 out of 684,654) (Ministry of Commerce and Industry,2019). In

addition, recent data presentedby the Assam Tea Tribes Welfare Ministry in 2020, indicates

that the proportionhas increased to 43.03% (2,912,23 out of 6,76,835). The temporary workers

get to work in tea gardens only for a few months a year, and the lesser pay, lack of social

security, and medical supportmake the position of these workers even more precarious.

India is one of the leading tea-producing countries in the world, and around half of the total

tea of the country (630–700 million kg every year) is produced in Assam (Government of

Assam, 2020). However, the precariousness of wage laborers in tea gardens has not received

enough attention from researchers yet. Especially the job precarity of the temporary workers

in tea gardens has not been discussed enough, and it lacks the attention of practitioners and

policymakers for ages. Further, the women temporary workers are at the margin due to the

intersectionality of gender and precarious work. Hence, this study aims to explore the plights

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