"The mere fact that their employers call themselves “Aggregators” and enter into the so-called “partnership agreements” does not take away the fact that there exists a jural relationship of employer and employee; master and servant," argues a petition filed by the Indian Federation of App-Based Workers (IFAT) in the Supreme Court on September 21. The petition demands that gig workers be declared as unorganised workers by the court and hence, be entitled to social security benefits under the Unorganised Workers Act 2008. Courts across the world, including in the UK, Netherlands, and France have declared that gig workers are employees. This petition could pave the way for similar legislation in India, bringing platform workers under the ambit of legal protections and social security benefits currently available to unorganised workers. Platforms are in an employer-employee relationship with gig workers: Petition The Code on Social Security 2020 defines a gig worker as a person who performs work 'outside of a traditional employee-employer relationship. In its petition, IFAT, which claims to have 35,000 gig workers as members, refutes this definition. The petition argues that there is a clear employee-employer relationship at play: [...] there is total control and supervision exercised by the aggregator upon their drivers, and this would necessarily mean that an App-based worker shares an Employer- Employee relationship with the Aggregator —IFAT petition To give weight to this argument, the petition points out several themes common to the terms and conditions of aggregators' work arrangement with gig-workers: 1. Mandatory use of…
