With 99 per cent porters unregistered at Asia’s biggest Mandi, workers highly vulnerable to exploitation: NASVI

New Delhi, Feb 28 (KNN) Responding to the news reports that more than 99 per cent of the porters are not formally registered and recognized on paper at Delhi’s Azadpur Mandi, National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI) raised that in such a scenario the workers are exposed to exploitation.

Azadpur Mandi, Asia’s biggest housed in the national capital has just two porters out of over 50,000 that are officially recognized as “porters” or “head-load workers” by the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC), a news report said.

It further quoted an RTI query according to which only 2 porters have been issued the G-Category badge in a market that operates on a large volume of 11,000-14,000 metric tonnes of fruits and vegetable every day.

Talking to KNN, Arbind Singh, National Coordinator of National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI) said that the concern of turning a blind eye when it comes to officially recognizing a   worker is prevalent across sectors, especially in the national capital.

“If one was to curate data and compare states, the finding would reveal that Delhi is the worst place for informal workers, whereas in states including Maharashtra and Kerala, the situation is likely to be better”, he added.

Explaining the concern further, Singh said that the main reason as to why the workers are deprived of their identity on paper is so that the employer can derive maximum output from the worker at inhumane standards and easily do away with the responsibilities.

“A fair environment is the one where there is a healthy relation between the worker and the employee whereas in the case of Delhi, it is not so”, he said.

Responding to the news report, Rajesh Goyal, Secretary of APMC In a press interview said that the issue has been brought into his notice and assured that the process to issue licenses will begin in a fortnight. (With Inputs from a media report) (KNN/DA)