DINDIGUL, India—For the past 15 years Vijayalakshmi has been breaking large rocks into small stones in granite quarries in Southern India, using her wages to buy explosives and hammers to help break more rocks.
Vijayalakshmi started working in the mines at age 17. She spent her first six years as a bonded worker. Still common in India’s granite quarries in the state of Tamil Nadu, the bonded labor system is a modern version of slavery.
Employers offer poverty-stricken laborers jobs that come with an “advance,” or interest-free loan. The laborers are then paid a paltry sum as wages, and are supposed to buy all their equipment from the wages and also pay back the advance.
The laborers have so many day-to-day costs that it is rare for them to pay back the loan and break free from the clutches of the quarry owner. Oftentimes the workers end up taking out more loans to pay for emergency needs.
For years, the laborer continues to work indebted, battling harsh working conditions, poverty, desperation, and exploitation. Many continue to take out more loans from the owner as the need arises since there is nowhere else to go to borrow money. It might be to build a home, marry off a daughter, or attend a festival with the family at the community temple.
“I started to work as a bonded laborer on an advance of 15,000 rupees [$272],” says Vijayalakshmi.
“I worked on a daily wage of 60–70 rupees ($1.09–$1.27) and used the advance to build a home in my village. I have two sons. My elder son who is 16 stopped going to school and is working in a textile mill and my younger son is going to government-sponsored school,” she said.
Vijayalakshmi is fortunate. Unlike thousands others, she is out of bondage and for the past two years she has been working at a quarry run by the Released Bonded Laborers Association at Thennampatti Village in Dindigul.
The association is a body consisting of workers who were released from bondage in 1997. At that point they worked on contract in private quarries, then in 2007, they started leasing an independent quarry from the government.
Vijayalakshmi breaks rocks into small sized stones called “challi.” To break a truckload of challi takes five days, for which she earns 300 rupees ($5.43).
In rural India, where caste and profession are still closely associated, the Odder caste in Tamil Nadu was the traditional stonebreakers and stone workers.
The Odders were divided into three types: Kal Odders (who broke stones), Maan Odders (who worked as masons) and Sunnambu Odders (who lay roads and white washed homes). These days, however, not just Odders, but people from other castes and all religions work in quarries as well.
Arumagam, 29, is an Odder working in the quarry leased to the Released Bonded Laborers Association. Arumagam dropped out of school at 11 and has been breaking stones ever since.
“It was very, very hard for me at that age, but there was no other way. My parents were already working in the quarry and because of the family’s poor economic condition, I had to work too,” he says, without ceasing to wield his hammer at a big piece of granite.
He had worked at granite quarries in 10 different places in the states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Karnataka, before coming to the association quarry.
“My three brothers and two sisters are all working here. We have grown up together in the quarries,” says Arumagam.
A cluster of monsoon clouds gather on the farm lands overlooking the quarry; it is a day of respite for the workers who work year round under the scorching sun.
Arumagam, continuing to work, says he breaks granite rocks into medium sized blocks called “aralai,” which are used to make walls for houses. For each piece he earns 3.50 rupees ($0.06) and he manages to produce 100–150 pieces per week. He spends 200 rupees ($3.62) per week on explosives, and a set of tools that lasts two to three years costs 2,000 rupees.
Arumagam enjoys more rights than workers in privately owned quarries. He gets bonuses, can demand wage hikes according to the market, and he participates in solving problems that pop up at the quarry.
Continued on the next page: According to S.P. Gnanamoni ...
According to S.P. Gnanamoni, director of Quarry Workers Development Society, there are 2 million quarry workers working in Tamil Nadu and almost 50 percent of those who work in private quarries are still under bonded labor.
Gnanamoni names a variety of laws that protect workers’ rights in theory, yet not in practice.
“No law is applicable in the quarries. No one cares about it!” he says.
There is also no medical insurance or compensation in case of accident, which is a common occurrence. There are no drinking water facilities or rest rooms on site either.
“Even in quarries where hundreds of women are working, there are no toilets. There’s not even a first aid box,” says Gnanamoni.
A short distance away, a few workers are gathered around the tea vendor who supplies tea daily at the quarry on foot. Amid the constant clatter of breaking stones, Gnanamoni continues to explain.
“A decade ago, when a worker met with an accident, the owner would take care of his medical expenses, but it would be added to the loan amount. Now as workers got together into a trade union, in half of the privately owned quarries they have started to get wage increases, bonuses, and medical leave with compensation. And a few quarries also have first aid boxes.”
These improvement, though, are still quite minimal compared to the large number of laborers at the almost 15,000 quarries in Tamil Nadu.
Arumagam says, “My life seems to have come to an end. The only hope for my life is to see my children go to school for higher studies and have a better life.”
A co-worker beside Arumagam reminds him that they are poor and education is very expensive. Arumagam rises to the challenge, “Even if education is expensive, difficult, or whatever, at least I'll try my level best.”
This determination for a better life has had an impact. When the Released Bonded Laborers Association leased the quarry from the government five years ago, they had to take out an $18,100 loan. Gnanamoni says they have already paid back the loan and have extra savings too, so that the next time the lease comes up, the association will be able to pay for it on its own.
For many families, two or three generations may be completely dependent on quarry work—the only work they know. But this might be changing due to rapid mechanization.
According to Gnanamoni, 100–200 quarries mostly in South Tamil Nadu have already become mechanized.
“A quarry which employs 1,000 workers can employ only 25 when mechanized. Moreover, a quarry which takes 70–80 years to exploit manually needs only 10 years when mechanized,” says Gnanamoni.
Finding new work for so many illiterate, unskilled workers is not an easy proposition, nor is it even imaginable for many.
At least for workers at the Released Bonded Laborers Association quarry sites, they can expect their meager livelihoods will be protected.
For Vijayalakshmi, when asked what she wants in life, without looking up or pausing from her work, she replies in a serious tone, “I have no other ambition but to get this job here permanently.”
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