Slavery in India’s Brick Kilns & the Payment System: Way forward in the fight for fair wages, decent work and eradication of slavery

This report was published in September 2017, by human rights organisations Anti-Slavery International (ASI), London, and Volunteers for Social Justice, Punjab. It notes that debt-bondage and child labour are extremely common in brick kilns in India and examines the various factors which contribute to the “the cycle of slavery in India’s brick kilns.”According to the United Nations’ Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery, the Slave Trade, and Institutions and Practices Similar to Slavery, debt-bondage is “the status or condition arising from a pledge by a debtor of his personal services or of those of a person under his control as security for a debt.” This report discusses the way brick kilns workers are recruited and paid, emphasising the importance of power relations in perpetuating cycles of debt-bondage and child labour in brick kilns. The report focuses on patheras (those who mould and dry the bricks from clay), who form most of the workforce in brick kilns in Punjab. It examines data from two primary sources, the first being a study conducted in 2016 by Kaarak – an advisory and professional services organisation based in New Delhi – on behalf of Anti-Slavery International, interviewing 383 brick kiln workers from Chhattisgarh, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. The other is a survey of over 3,000 brick kiln workers from Punjab conducted by Volunteers for Social Justice between 2015 and 2016.The 64-page report is divided into five chapters: Executive Summary (chapter 1); Introduction (chapter 2); Key Findings & Analysis (chapter 3); Conclusion and Recommendations (chapter 4); Appendix: Full Research Findings (chapter 5). This last chapter is further divided into six sections: Who is working at the kilns? (section A); A new form of bondage: The recruitment and payment system- debt and withholding of wages (section B); Working hours, overtime, entitlements and leave (section C); Transfer between kilns (section D); Employment records and registers (section E); Access to basic amenities, health and education (section F).