Chapter 8 Law And Social Justice

Recall the journey of a shirt from the cotton field to the final product, as discussed in previous chapters. This process involves a chain of markets where buying and selling occur at multiple stages, connecting producers (like small farmers or weavers) to consumers (buyers of the shirt).

However, this chain often reveals instances of **exploitation** or unfair situations faced by individuals involved, whether they are small farmers producing cotton, weavers, or factory workers. Markets, while facilitating exchange, can be exploitative towards people in their various roles as **workers, consumers, or producers**.

To safeguard people from such exploitation and unfair practices in the markets, the **government enacts certain laws**. These laws are designed to minimise unjust practices and promote social justice within economic activities.

Law And Social Justice

Laws are essential for ensuring fairness in various market situations. A common example is the issue of **workers' wages**. Businesses, in their pursuit of maximum profit, might resort to unfair practices such as denying workers their rightful wages or paying them extremely low amounts.

From a legal perspective, it is **illegal** for employers to deny workers their wages. To address underpayment and ensure fair compensation, the government implements laws such as the **Minimum Wages Act**. This law stipulates that an employer must pay a worker not less than a specified **minimum wage**, which is periodically reviewed and increased.

Just as minimum wage laws protect workers, other laws exist to safeguard the interests of **producers and consumers** in the market. These laws aim to regulate the relationships between workers, consumers, and producers to prevent exploitation and ensure that transactions and employment conditions are governed by fair practices.

Table 1 outlines some important laws aimed at protecting various interests in the market:

Format 2 (Horizontal)

However, enacting laws is only the first step. The government must also ensure that these laws are **implemented** or **enforced**. Enforcement is particularly critical for protecting the vulnerable and weak from exploitation by the strong. For example, enforcing minimum wage laws requires regular inspections of workplaces and imposing penalties on employers who fail to comply. When workers are poor and lack power, they may fear losing their jobs or facing retaliation if they demand fair wages, making strong enforcement by the government essential.

The government's role in making, enforcing, and upholding laws is vital for regulating the activities of individuals and companies to ensure **social justice**. Many of these laws are rooted in the **Fundamental Rights** guaranteed by the Indian Constitution, such as the Right against Exploitation, which prohibits forced labour and child labour.

The 2011 census revealed that millions of children aged 5-14 were engaged in various occupations. In 2016, India amended the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, completely banning the employment of children under 14 and restricting adolescents (14-18) from hazardous work. Violations are considered serious offenses with penalties including jail terms and fines ($\textsf{₹}$20,000 to $\textsf{₹}$50,000). The government has also initiated online platforms (like PENCIL) to aid in enforcement and monitoring of child labour projects, demonstrating efforts to translate legal principles into practice.

Bhopal Gas Tragedy

The **Bhopal Gas Tragedy**, occurring on the night of **December 2, 1984**, stands as the world's worst industrial disaster. At midnight, a highly poisonous gas, **Methyl Isocyanate (MIC)**, leaked from the Union Carbide (UC) pesticide factory in Bhopal, India. Within three days, thousands died, and hundreds of thousands were severely affected.

The victims were primarily poor, working-class families living near the factory. Over 50,000 survivors were left too ill to work, suffering from severe respiratory problems, eye damage, and other disorders. Many children born to survivors developed abnormalities.

The disaster was not an accident but a direct result of **Union Carbide deliberately neglecting essential safety measures** to reduce costs. Earlier incidents of gas leaks in the plant had occurred, resulting in deaths and injuries, highlighting the ignored warning signs.

Despite overwhelming evidence of its responsibility, UC refused to accept accountability for the disaster. The Indian government filed a civil case against UC in the US for \$3 billion in compensation but eventually accepted a much lower settlement of \$470 million in 1989. Survivors contested this amount, but the Supreme Court upheld the settlement.

The struggle for justice for the Bhopal victims continues even decades later, with demands for safe drinking water (as toxic chemicals left behind by UC contaminated the groundwater), healthcare facilities, jobs for those incapacitated by the gas, and prosecution of the former UC chairman, Warren Anderson.

These photos depict various aspects of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy's aftermath and the ongoing struggle for justice: mass cremations symbolise the scale of death, a gas-affected child represents the severe health impacts, bags of chemicals near the plant show the environmental contamination, protests highlight collective demands for accountability, and victims meeting officials reflect the fight for relief and recognition.

The **struggle for justice continues** as the toxic chemicals left behind by UC continue to contaminate the environment, and the current owner, Dow Chemical, refuses to clean up the site. This ongoing situation underscores the long-term consequences of inadequate industrial safety and environmental responsibility.

What Is A Worker’s Worth?

The reasons why multinational corporations like Union Carbide establish factories in countries like India are often related to **cost savings**, particularly cheap labour. Wages for workers in developed countries like the USA are significantly higher than in developing countries. Companies can hire workers for lower pay and often demand longer working hours, while also facing fewer expenses for facilities like housing. These factors allow companies to reduce operational costs and increase profits.

Cost-cutting measures can extend to reducing safety standards, a more dangerous approach. At the UC plant in Bhopal, safety devices were often malfunctioning or insufficient. The workforce in the MIC plant was halved between 1980 and 1984, and safety training was drastically reduced from six months to just 15 days. A night-shift worker position crucial for monitoring was also eliminated. This contrasts sharply with the safety systems at UC's plant in West Virginia, USA, which had computerised warning systems and emergency plans, indicating a deliberate double standard.

The stark differences in safety standards and the low compensation for victims after the disaster raise a critical question about the perceived **worth of an Indian worker**. Due to high unemployment, there is a large pool of workers willing to accept employment even in unsafe conditions for a wage. Employers exploit this vulnerability, neglecting safety to save money.

Years after the Bhopal tragedy, accidents in workplaces like construction sites, mines, and factories due to employers' negligence remain common. This persistence highlights that the problem of devaluing worker safety is widespread, particularly when workers are vulnerable and lack power.

This photo depicts an accident at a construction site, where safety equipment and precautions are often neglected. Such incidents highlight the risks faced by workers in hazardous jobs and the ongoing issue of employers prioritising cost savings over worker safety.

Comparing the high compensation awarded to tourists for a poorly managed trip (\$8 lakh) with the meagre amount received by Bhopal victims for a lifetime of suffering (\$470 million divided among hundreds of thousands) underscores the stark disparity in how lives and suffering are valued differently, particularly when one group is economically vulnerable and lacks power.

Enforcement Of Safety Laws

The government is responsible for both enacting and **enforcing** safety laws to protect its citizens, particularly workers. It is the government's duty to uphold the **Right to Life** guaranteed by Article 21 of the Constitution, which includes the right to safe working conditions. However, in the case of the UC plant in Bhopal, there were serious failures in law enforcement.

Firstly, India's safety laws at the time were relatively **lax** compared to international standards. Secondly, even these weaker laws were **poorly enforced** by government agencies. Government officials failed to recognise the UC plant as hazardous and allowed it to be located in a populated area. Concerns raised by municipal officials about safety violations were dismissed, as the government prioritised the plant's investment and job creation over safety concerns.

Government inspectors continued to approve the plant's procedures, despite repeated gas leaks indicating serious problems. This meant that the government, which should have protected the people's interests, was neglecting their safety by failing to ensure strict adherence to even the existing weak laws. Both the government and the private company were accountable for this disregard for safety.

This situation is undesirable, especially as India sees increasing industrialisation with both local and foreign businesses. There is a pressing need for **stronger laws protecting workers' rights and safety**, coupled with much better enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance. Enforcement of safety laws is vital in any factory to prevent accidents, injuries, and loss of life among workers who operate machinery and handle potentially hazardous materials.

Situations where laws or rules exist but are not followed due to poor enforcement include traffic rules (e.g., over-speeding, not wearing helmets/seat belts, using mobile phones while driving), environmental regulations, and building codes. Problems in enforcement often stem from insufficient inspection staff, corruption, lack of public awareness, and the vulnerability of those affected. Improving enforcement could involve increasing inspections, imposing stricter penalties, raising public awareness, and empowering affected parties to report violations safely.

New Laws To Protect The Environment

Before the Bhopal disaster in 1984, India had very few laws specifically protecting the environment, and their enforcement was negligible. The environment – rivers, air, groundwater – was treated as a resource that could be polluted without restriction, disregarding the health impacts on people.

Union Carbide not only benefited from lower safety standards but also avoided the cost of cleaning up pollution, which is typically a required part of production in countries like the USA. The Bhopal disaster brought the issue of **environmental protection** forcefully to the forefront. It highlighted that industrial accidents could harm not just workers but also surrounding communities, prompting a realisation that existing laws were insufficient and focused too narrowly on individual workers.

Following pressure from environmental activists and the public, the Indian government introduced **new environmental laws**. These laws established the principle that the **polluter must be held accountable** for the environmental damage caused. The understanding emerged that the environment is a shared resource for present and future generations and cannot be sacrificed solely for industrial development.

The courts have also played a significant role, issuing judgments that recognise the **right to a healthy environment** as an inherent part of the **Fundamental Right to Life (Article 21)**. In cases like Subhash Kumar vs. State of Bihar (1991), the Supreme Court explicitly ruled that the right to enjoy pollution-free water and air is essential for the full enjoyment of life. The government is mandated to create and enforce laws to control pollution, clean up affected areas (like rivers), and impose heavy fines on polluters.

Environment As A Public Facility

A "**clean environment is a public facility**" because, like other public facilities (water, healthcare, etc.), its benefits are shared by everyone in society. Access to clean air, water, and a healthy ecosystem is essential for the well-being and safety of all citizens, not just a select few. Just as the government is responsible for providing public goods, it is also responsible for protecting the environment, which benefits the entire public.

However, court orders on environmental issues, such as directing polluting industries to close or relocate, have sometimes had negative impacts on people's livelihoods. When factories close, workers lose jobs. Relocation can force workers to move far from home. Furthermore, moving polluting industries often just shifts the pollution problem to new areas, rather than solving it fundamentally. This highlights a conflict between environmental protection and economic interests, where the poor (workers and those living near polluting industries) often bear the brunt of both pollution and job losses.

Recent studies suggest that increasing environmental concern among the middle classes sometimes prioritises aesthetic improvements (like cleaning up slums or moving factories out of sight) over the safety and livelihoods of the poor workers affected. The challenge is to find solutions that ensure a clean environment benefits everyone without disproportionately harming vulnerable populations.

This photo shows pumps at contaminated wells near the UC factory in Bhopal painted red by the government to warn people. Despite this warning, locals often continue to use these wells due to lack of access to other clean water sources, illustrating the lasting impact of pollution and the ongoing struggle for basic facilities like safe water in affected areas.

This photo shows workers standing outside closed factories in Delhi. When industries are closed or relocated due to environmental concerns, many workers lose their jobs. They may end up in precarious employment situations like daily wage labour or small, less regulated units with poorer working conditions and weaker legal protections, highlighting the social cost of such environmental measures if not coupled with rehabilitation plans.

Achieving a clean environment that benefits everyone requires transitioning to cleaner technologies and processes in factories, with government support and financial penalties for polluters. This approach can protect workers' livelihoods while ensuring a safe environment for both workers and nearby communities.

Vehicle emissions, particularly from diesel cars and the increasing number of vehicles, remain a major source of air pollution despite efforts like shifting public transport to CNG (Compressed Natural Gas).

Conclusion

Laws are essential in various economic spheres, including markets, offices, and factories, to protect people from unfair practices. The pursuit of higher profits often drives private companies and individuals to engage in exploitation, such as paying low wages, using child labour, neglecting working conditions, and causing environmental damage that harms surrounding populations.

Therefore, a major role of the government is to act as a regulator, controlling the activities of private entities by **making, enforcing, and upholding laws**. This is done to prevent unfair practices and ensure **social justice**. The government must create laws that are appropriate and effectively enforce them, as weak or poorly enforced laws can lead to severe harm, as tragically demonstrated by the Bhopal gas disaster.

While the government has the primary responsibility, citizens also play a crucial role by exerting pressure on both private companies and the government to act in the best interests of society. The environment is an example where public advocacy and judicial action have successfully established the right to a healthy environment as intrinsic to the Right to Life.

Similarly, the rights of workers – including the right to work, fair wages, and decent working conditions – remain areas where significant unfairness persists. People must continue to advocate for stronger laws protecting workers' interests to ensure that the Right to Life is fully realised for everyone, extending beyond mere existence to include a life with dignity and safety.

It is important to note that some hazardous industries are relocated from developed to developing countries to take advantage of weaker environmental and safety laws in the latter, posing risks to workers and communities in these nations (e.g., industries producing pesticides, asbestos, or processing zinc/lead in South Asian countries). Ship-breaking is another hazardous industry growing in South Asia, where old ships containing dangerous substances are dismantled by workers, often under unsafe conditions.

This photo shows workers dismantling a ship in Alang, Gujarat, an example of the hazardous ship-breaking industry. This work exposes labourers to dangerous substances and conditions, highlighting the need for strong safety regulations and enforcement in industries relocated to developing countries.