Much of India's $42 billion-a-year textile and clothing export industry is located in western Tamil Nadu. (File Photo)
Highlights
- Teen couldn't cope with work pressure, complained of harassment: Report
- Girl's parents convinced her to stay and complete contract period: Report
- Mills often only pay the salaries of workers at the end of fixed terms
An investigation into the death of a teenage girl working in a spinning mill in Tamil Nadu has raised fresh concerns over the working conditions of textile workers, especially those trapped in bonded labour.
The 17-year-old girl, the daughter of farm workers, was found unconscious in her room in a mill compound in Vellakoil in Tirupur district, on March 10 after failing to show up for a regular overtime shift.
The cause of her death remains unknown, pending results of a post-mortem investigation. However, police said they had arrested a co-worker on charges of abetment to suicide.
Civil society groups are calling for a full investigation into the case, saying cases of suicides related to sexual abuse and labour exploitation in the booming textile industry go largely unreported.
A report into the girl's death by the Tamil Nadu Textile and Common Labour Union, a women-led trade union set up to represent women in the textile industry, said the teenage mill worker had found it difficult to cope with the work pressure. "Every day she did four hours of overtime, after completing an eight-hour shift. After one year, she wanted to leave, but her parents convinced her to complete the contract period," the report said. "She was sexually harassed by a male worker and had complained to her brother and the mill management."
Repeated attempts to reach the management at the mill were unsuccessful.
The teenager had worked in the textile industry - the second-largest employer in India after agriculture - for nearly two years. She was paid Rs 210 per day, which her mother collected each month.
Much of India's $42 billion-a-year textile and clothing export industry is located in western Tamil Nadu and to boost productivity and increase margins, parts of this lucrative supply chain are built on bonded labour.
Mills mainly hire young girls, offering Rs 30,000 to 60,000 rupees to their families for three years' work under so-called "Sumangali" schemes with the money paid at the end of the fixed term, in a form of bonded labour.
A study in 2014 into Tamil Nadu's textile industry by the Freedom Fund, a philanthropic initiative dedicated to ending modern slavery, and the C&A Foundation found workers were also often subjected to low wages, excessive and sometimes forced overtime requirements, lack of freedom of movement as well as verbal and sexual abuse.
The study said it was difficult to gauge the exact scale of the problem, but a conservative estimate suggests there may be at least 100,000 girls and young women being exploited in this way.