India’s labour market has undergone profound changes over the past decade, with the rapid rise of the gig economy standing out as one of the most significant transformations. Characterized by short-term, flexible contracts facilitated by digital platforms, gig work has become a key component of the country’s employment landscape.

According to NITI Aayog, India currently has around 7.7 million gig workers—a number expected to reach 23.5 million by 2030. In the long term, this sector could create up to 90 million jobs annually. However, as this workforce expands, the urgent need for regulations and enhanced protections for gig workers has become increasingly apparent, drawing substantial public and policy attention.

Gig Work in India: An Overview

India’s gig economy spans various sectors, including food delivery, ride-hailing, e-commerce, and freelance services. Platforms like Swiggy, Zomato, Ola, and Urban Company have established themselves as key players, creating new job opportunities. Gig work is not a new concept to India with 85 per cent of the Indian population being employed via the informal economy and ‘casual workers’ segment. India has always had the equivalent of gig work across urban and rural areas—from temporary farm workers to daily-wage construction labourers to household help. Thus, a significant potential for further adoption in labour-intensive sectors like construction, manufacturing and other functional roles remains untapped. What technology has enabled is the ability to provide on-demand delivery requests at a large scale.

The flexibility of gig work has become especially appealing to those seeking supplemental income, enabling individuals to work according to their schedules. A Fairwork India (2023) report found that over 90 per cent of gig workers in food delivery and ride-hailing valued the autonomy these roles provide. However, despite this flexibility, gig workers—often classified as independent contractors or delivery ‘partners’—lack essential labour protections, such as minimum wage guarantees, health benefits, and social security, often amid public apathy. As India’s gig workforce continues to grow, calls for stronger regulatory frameworks have become increasingly urgent.

Regulation of the Gig Economy: Current Status and Gaps

India’s labour regulations have historically catered to formal employment, leaving gig workers in legal limbo. However, recent legislative developments have sought to address this gap. The Code on Social Security (2020) marked a significant policy milestone by extending social security benefits to gig workers. The legislation mandates that platform companies contribute to schemes covering life and disability insurance, health benefits, and old-age protection.

Nevertheless, as of 2024, implementing these labour codes needs to be faster and more balanced. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), only 10 per cent of gig workers in India currently receive social security benefits. Many companies have delayed or avoided compliance, leaving millions needing access to basic protections. This implementation gap underscores the need for more robust enforcement mechanisms and clearer definitions of gig workers’ legal status.

Judicial interventions have also shaped the regulatory landscape. In a pivotal 2024 ruling, the Delhi High Court sided with Swiggy Delivery Executives who challenged their classification as independent contractors. The court ruled that these workers were, in effect, employees and thus entitled to benefits such as health insurance and paid leave. This ruling marks a potential turning point in how Indian courts view gig work, aligning with global trends. For instance, in 2021, the UK Supreme Court ruled that Uber drivers should be treated as “workers,” granting them access to minimum wage protections and holiday pay.

However, regulatory efforts face significant challenges. The fluid nature of gig work—where workers may shift between platforms or engage in both formal and informal employment—complicates the application of labour laws. This fluidity requires a more nuanced policy approach that accounts for the unique characteristics of gig work while ensuring that all workers receive adequate protection.

The Wage Fairness Debate

Wage fairness remains one of the most contentious issues in India’s gig economy. Operating on a commission-based model means payment per task rather than a fixed salary. While this model allows for high earnings during periods of peak demand, it also leaves workers vulnerable to income fluctuations as seen during the rise in fuel prices and inflation where food delivery executives saw their average earnings drop by 30 per cent between 2020 and 2024 due to changes in algorithmic pay structures and workers were forced to bear rising fuel costs, eroding their take-home pay.

In response, gig workers demanded fairer pay structures and transparency in calculations of commissions The government’s new minimum wage guidelines, introduced in 2023, attempted to address these concerns by establishing a minimum wage for gig workers. 

However, enforcing these guidelines has proven difficult, as platforms argue that the commission-based model does not align with traditional wage structures. This has led to calls for sector-specific wage regulations that reflect the realities of gig work, such as fuel price compensation and guaranteed base earnings.

Social Security for Gig Workers: Progress and Challenges

India’s gig workers face significant challenges, chief among them a lack of social security coverage. While the Code on Social Security aimed to address this by mandating benefits like life insurance and maternity support for gig workers, the progress has been slow, and the impact remains limited.

In September 2024, the Indian government launched a pilot initiative to provide health insurance for gig workers under the Employees’ State Insurance (ESI) scheme, aiming to cover one million workers by 2025. While this program marks a step forward, experts argue that it barely scratches the surface. Given the diversity of gig work—spanning food delivery, ride-hailing, and freelance services—many argue that a tailored, multi-layered approach is essential to meet the unique needs of gig workers, many of whom rely on gig jobs as primary income.

A sustainable solution could be the establishment of a ‘national social security fund’ for gig workers, funded partly by contributions from gig platforms. This fund would provide health insurance, pension plans, and unemployment benefits, offering a safety net against sudden income loss. Such a system would allow gig workers to maintain flexibility while receiving protections similar to traditional employees. Raising awareness among gig workers about their entitlements under labour codes is also crucial, empowering them to claim the rights they’re legally afforded.

To truly build an inclusive gig economy, policy solutions must evolve beyond pilot programs, embedding social protection at scale and actively involving both gig platforms and the state in securing long-term benefits for this growing workforce.

Incorporating Women in the Gig Economy

Globally, economies have long overlooked the contributions of female labour, especially in unpaid or informal sectors, leading to significant undervaluation and invisibility in GDP metrics. A report by the McKinsey Global Institute estimates that advancing gender equality across India’s workforce—including informal labour—could add a substantial $770 billion, or about 18 per cent, to the GDP by 2025. This underscores the tremendous yet untapped economic potential of women, particularly those in the informal economy.

The gig economy offers a unique opportunity to formalize and bring visibility to women’s contributions. It provides a potential pathway for women to access supplementary income, enter the job market more easily, and experience greater social mobility. By breaking down some of the traditional barriers to workforce participation, the gig economy can help women navigate systemic challenges and achieve a stronger foothold in the labour market.

However, realizing this potential requires targeted policy interventions to make gig jobs safer and more accessible to women. Efforts to ensure safe working conditions, flexible work arrangements, and enhanced social protections will be essential in fostering an inclusive gig economy that empowers women and integrates their contributions into the formal workforce.

Looking Ahead: New Models for Worker Protection

As India’s gig economy continues to evolve, innovative approaches to regulation and worker protection are essential. One promising model is the gig worker cooperative, where workers band together to negotiate better terms and conditions with platforms. This model, already adopted in some European countries, empowers gig workers by giving them a collective voice in decision-making processes. In India, gig worker cooperatives could be particularly effective in sectors like food delivery and home services, where workers often face similar challenges.

Another emerging trend is the rise of platform cooperatives, where workers themselves own and manage the platforms they work for. This model distributes profits more equitably and gives workers greater control over their working conditions. While still in its infancy in India, platform cooperatives could offer an alternative to the traditional gig economy model, promoting more equitable outcomes for workers.

Finally, increased transparency in gig platforms’ pay algorithms is critical for ensuring wage fairness. Platforms should be required to disclose how pay structures are determined and provide workers with clear explanations for any changes to their earnings. This transparency would help prevent arbitrary reductions in pay and allow workers to make more informed decisions about their work.

India’s gig economy offers immense potential for economic growth and job creation, but its rapid expansion has exposed significant challenges in terms of regulation and worker protection. While recent legislative and judicial developments represent progress, much work remains to be done. Moving forward, a combination of innovative regulatory approaches, such as gig worker cooperatives and platform ownership models, and stronger enforcement of labour protections, will be essential for ensuring that gig workers receive fair wages and social security. By addressing these challenges, India can create a more equitable gig economy that benefits workers, platforms, and the broader economy alike.

Diksha Yadav is a political analyst and columnist; Amal Chandra is an author, policy analyst and columnist. 

Follow them on ‘X’: @DikshaYadav____ & @ens_socialis 

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Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world

Republicans have won a majority in the House of Representatives, giving Donald Trump’s party full control of both chambers of the US Congress and wide latitude to push a radical agenda through the legislature.

Democratic House leader Hakeem Jeffries congratulated Republican Speaker of the House Mike Johnson late on Wednesday, after several television networks projected Trump’s party would retain control of the House.

“House Democrats gave it our all, running aggressive, forward-looking and people-centred campaigns,” Jeffries said. “While we will not regain control of the Congress in January, falling just a few seats short, House Democrats will hold Republicans to a razor-thin majority.”

The House verdict comes more than a week after Trump won a convincing election victory over Kamala Harris in the presidential race and means that when he is inaugurated in January his party will control the House and Senate.

The unified government will hand Trump considerable freedom to push through his legislative agenda, including plans to renew and expand sweeping tax cuts.

The House result, which came after more than a week of counting in California and other states, is a blow to Democrats, who will be minorities in both the Senate and House and unable to lead powerful congressional committees to oversee investigations into the Trump administration’s actions.

With nine House races yet to be called, the margin of the Republican majority has not been confirmed. But the Associated Press declared late on Wednesday that Trump’s party had secured the 218 seats necessary to retain control of the 435-member body.

Republicans will also have a firm grip on the Senate — where Democrats had held a slim majority — after picking up four seats in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and Montana.

Republican senators on Wednesday elected John Thune to replace Mitch McConnell as the party’s leader in the upper chamber. McConnell, 82, remains a senator but said last year he would step down from leadership following health issues.

Johnson, the Republican congressman from Louisiana and close ally of Trump who became Speaker last year, has said he intends to remain in the role.

Trump also presided over a unified government during the first tow years of his first administration, before Democrats won back control of the House in the 2018 midterm elections.

But many in Washington expect Trump to exert a tighter grip on Congress this time, given the unwavering loyalty he commands from many top lawmakers, including the leaders of both chambers. In his first administration, he often faced opposition from McConnell and then-Speaker Paul Ryan.

Still, Trump will not have unchecked power over Congress, and Democrats may be able to exert leverage over his administration in narrow but meaningful ways.

Although budget and tax changes require only a simple majority of both chambers, and the president’s appointments can also be confirmed with the backing of 50 senators, most other legislation will need to break the Senate filibuster — a 60-vote threshold — to become law.

That means Senate Democrats could block other Trump legislative priorities — including laws to crack down on immigration at the US-Mexico border, or repeal the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare — unless Senate Republicans take the drastic step of scrapping the filibuster altogether. Thune on Wednesday said the filibuster would be “unchanged” so long as he was Senate majority leader.

Hong Kong’s blank-cheque companies are landing their first acquisition targets but corporate executives warn that tight rules are stifling the risk-taking they are meant to reward.

Last month heralded the first Hong Kong special purpose acquisition vehicle to close a deal, merging with Synagistics, a Singaporean ecommerce company.

The acquisition by the blank-cheque company, headed up by Norman Chan, former head of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, is likely to be followed by two other mergers that are awaiting final approval from regulators.

Hong Kong authorities regard Spacs, permitted for the first time in 2022, as a way to reanimate their domestic equity market and attract more international companies to list in the territory.

Spacs typically look to raise funds through listing on a stock market, and then aim to purchase a private company, pulling its target on to public markets — a so-called de-spac transaction.

But executives who have been through the process are warning that trickle is unlikely to become a flood.

“Arguably, it’s actually more complicated in terms of process than to go through a listing,” said Katherine Tsang, who was an executive director of the investment vehicle behind the Synagistics deal alongside Chan. She is also a former chair of Standard Chartered in Greater China.

After conducting merger talks with a promising private company, “they still need it to go through the entire IPO vetting process”, she added.

The experience underscores the delicate balance for Hong Kong as it tries to maintain its attractiveness as an international listings hub while its market moves closer to mainland China.

KPMG estimates the territory is the fourth-largest market for new listings by market value this year, but the numbers were boosted by just one company — the $4bn listing of Midea, a Chinese electronics manufacturer.

China’s sluggish rebound from the coronavirus pandemic has also damped stock market valuations. Hong Kong’s equity market has received a much-needed boost from Beijing’s policy stimulus launched in September, with the Hang Seng index notching its best week since 1998 upon the news of the policy blitz.

But the market has since come down as investors express disappointment in the mainland fiscal stimulus so far and hedge the potential damage of a second Donald Trump presidency in the US.

Authorities sought to emulate the Spac boom in the US in 2021, which raised some $163bn for companies to hunt for deal targets, according to data from Dealogic. The new rules were intended as another route for dealmaking in Asia.

“The beauty of a Spac is that the funds are ready, and for companies looking to list on the Hong Kong exchange I think it will be an attractive alternative to the listing path,” said Jean Thio, capital markets partner at law firm Clifford Chance.

She pointed out that private companies could establish their valuations through direct negotiation with an acquirer, rather than rely on the market price.

“There might be special interest for specialist tech companies as well as companies without market peers listed on the HK exchange,” she said.

However, Hong Kong also sought to guard against low standards: the US boom was widely seen as leading to a bubble — with one short seller dubbing them “castles in the sky”. Critics of the boom in the US say it enriched Spac founders and advisers while often punishing investors, especially retail money.

“I didn’t feel entirely comfortable with it [in the US] . . . the promoters were some strange characters, baseball stars, with no actual finance experience acting as promoters,” said Chan.

The regulations stipulate that Hong Kong Spacs have to meet all the same requirements as an initial public offering. Moreover, unlike in the US, investing in Spacs is only open to professional investors rather than being a retail money play.

Only five Spacs have raised money in Hong Kong since the new rules were introduced nearly three years ago, according to Dealogic.

Optimists say Spacs can find their utility by helping more niche, or foreign, companies list on the Hong Kong exchange.

Chan said his company’s “network”, which includes the main investors in the Spac, would help the Singaporean data company attract vendors in Greater China who are targeting the large south-east Asian market.

But as Hong Kong moves closer to mainland China economically, market participants fear the territory’s capital markets are still overly reliant on Chinese companies looking for an offshore secondary listing.

“The traditional [Chinese] A-share companies doing secondary listings would not be able to do a de-spac,” added Thio.

“In fact, any kind of Chinese companies would be subject to CSRC [mainland Chinese regulator] rules and regulatory approvals. It’s something that puts the timeline into uncertainty.”

One adviser who works on Spac transactions in Hong Kong said they were doubtful the new listing avenue would lead to any meaningful amount of new companies listing in the territory. 

“Hong Kong has always said they don’t like backdoor listings. But [de-]spacs are by definition backdoor listings,” said the adviser, who did not have authorisation to speak publicly. 

“It’s no different to applying for a new initial public offering — you need all the vetting. If you look around, the global trend is that Spacs have not done well. I don’t think they will get bigger in the future.”

Synagistics’s share price has underlined the growing caution. After listing it leapt as much as 400 per cent from its debut price of HK$10 ($1.29) per share. On Wednesday it closed down at HK$12.50.

Browse the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) web pages of corporate India and you may notice the frequent absence of one word: “caste”.

“Gender”, “sexuality”, “physical ability” and “race” all get regular mentions on these public-facing sites, but “caste” — which negatively affects the lives of hundreds of millions of Indians — is usually missing.

Occasionally, the term can be found in downloadable documents, such as a company’s code of conduct. But, often, it is omitted there, too.

“It’s not surprising — it’s not a topic most Indian companies want to talk about,” says Christina Dhanuja, a DEI-caste strategist based in Chennai, South India.

Caste — an ancient system of social hierarchy based on purity and heredity — is a sensitive topic in India because discussing it also means talking about the privilege of the upper castes and the role of the country’s dominant religion, Hinduism.

It is also a subject that induces fatigue, because much has already been tried. India banned caste-based discrimination when it wrote its new constitution after independence in 1947 and it reserves 50 per cent of government jobs and university places for marginalised groups.

But these quotas are contentious and breed resentment among those who feel they cannot land coveted government jobs as a result. “It’s why our officials are so inefficient,” the boss of a chartered accountancy company told the FT recently.

With these measures failing to bring about equality or the demise of caste, many have placed their hopes in economic growth and modernisation. Yet, increasingly, this appears to have been a false hope and caste is now the lens through which many are viewing economic inequality.

“An undeniably unique feature of economic inequalities in India is that they are closely intertwined with the deeply rooted caste system,” say economists including Thomas Piketty in a recent report for the World Inequality Lab (WIL), a Paris-based research organisation.

Indeed, it is such a feature that, this month, the south Indian state of Telangana became the third to hold a caste census, to establish which communities are being left behind.

India’s opposition parties are also calling for a national caste census — to which the ruling Bharatiya Janata party may have to agree, given that low-caste Indians make up the majority of the population.

Caste was first laid out in Hindu scripture 3,000 years ago and has evolved into a hierarchy of four levels: Brahmins, or priests, at the top; followed by rulers and warriors; then merchants and labourers; and, below all, the Dalits, or untouchables.

Priests and warriors, together, are referred to as the upper castes and they own about 55 per cent of the country’s wealth, according to the WIL. They are thought to account for about 20 per cent of the population, but no one knows for sure because the last caste census was in 1931.

Dalits account for about 16 per cent of the population, or 220mn people, and can still face exclusion or even violence because of their caste, especially in rural areas. Labourers — who can also face discrimination — account for about 50 per cent, or 700mn people.

People in companies like to say they are caste blind, but in reality caste is everywhere

Caste is not as strictly enforced in cities, but it still plays a role in almost all social and economic relationships.

“People in companies like to say they are caste blind but, in reality, caste is everywhere,” says Meenakshi, a DEI expert with the Chennai-based human resources consultancy Kelp who prefers not to give a surname because of its privileged caste associations.

Many people still get asked their caste in job interviews and some Brahmin groups organise Brahmin-only job fairs.

One CEO of an investment firm recently told the FT that he did not feel bad about the caste imbalance at his firm because “Dalits have the quota system for their jobs”. He added that his company has a corporate social responsibility policy that assists marginalised communities through charity.

DEI principles finally arrived in India via multinational companies a few years ago, and have taken off both as corporate policy and as a public relations tactic.

However, Meenakshi says its provenance meant it came with priorities dictated by the west: it gave huge importance to issues such as women and race, but largely skipped over the issue of caste.

Many Indian companies have stuck with this template, but Meenakshi, Dhanuja and others want to “Indianise” the model so it incorporates caste at a high level.

This, they argue, will be good for the companies involved, unlocking wider pools of talent and a greater diversity of views. They point to various studies by McKinsey, the management consultancy, showing that the more racially and gender diverse company is, the better it performs.

Similarly, in 2019, the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore released a paper showing that, when two companies dominated by different castes merge or acquire one another, they generate more market value then when two companies dominated by the same caste unite. However, the paper also noted that most companies prefer to merge with or buy entities with the same caste profile.

This search for sameness affects Indian companies’ hiring, too. In 2012, Canadian researchers found that 91 per cent of board directors in India’s top 1,000 companies came from the top two castes.

And a study by Jawaharlal Nehru University, in that same year, showed that candidates with high-caste Hindu names were 60 per cent more likely to be called for interview than people with low-caste names if otherwise identical CVs were submitted.

Statistics on the exact make-up of organisations today are impossible to find because very few companies keep records on caste. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that lower castes are vastly unrepresented in well-paid jobs.

“In an office of one hundred, you might not find a single Dalit,” says Vaibhav Wankede, a marketing executive from Mumbai who has written about the difficulties of being lower caste in white collar workplaces.

Everything from the food we eat to the holidays we celebrate is a marker of who we are. Most Dalits just try to keep their heads down and get on with the work

He says that Dalits often feel they need to mask their identity at work. “It’s everything from the food we eat, to the holidays we celebrate — all of that is a marker of who we are and a potential reason for exclusion,” Wankede explains, adding that “most Dalits just try to keep their heads down and get on with the work.”

To address the issue, Dhanuja suggests starting with something small like a survey, and then building up to in-person awareness sessions where the impact of caste is discussed.

But she says the way managers ultimately decide to bring caste into their DEI polices depends on the industry, the composition of their current staff, and what goals they set.

Meenakshi advocates a similar approach, focusing on teaching people what casteism looks like, and rethinking hiring practices so companies spot candidates who have skills they really need.

“All too often, the definition of merit is shaped by the skills upper-caste candidates tend to have: good spoken English, social confidence,” Meenakshi cautions — adding that companies should not discount the tenacity and hard work it takes for a lower-caste candidate to get to the same interview as higher-caste candidates.

Lastly, Dhanuja says companies should consider putting out caste-positive jobs ads, explicitly stating that roles are open to people of Dalit or other marginalised backgrounds.

She would, she says, go further and set targets for lower-caste hires, but she knows from quotas in the state sector that this can easily fail if HR managers are unsupportive.

For companies that think this all sounds too much like hard work, Dhanuja points out that caste awareness is on the rise and failure to adapt is risky. “If a company doesn’t want to do anything about it, they are just exposing themselves to law suits and reputational damage,” she warns.

But Pratap Tambe — a manager at Tata Consultancy Services and a frequent speaker on caste — is less convinced. He warns that any sudden shifts could result in a “backlash from negatively impacted interests” and a “high risk” of false discrimination allegations.