India’s labor ministry is pushing the country’s burgeoning fast-paced trade sector to prioritize the health and safety of gig workers.
The country’s labor and employment minister, Mansukh Mandaviya, met with executives from Zomato’s BlinkIt, Swiggy’s Instamart, and Zepto to ask them to drop their marketing language, which promises delivery in 10 minutes, and to discuss ways to improve safety and working conditions for delivery personnel, Bloomberg reportedciting an anonymous source.
While the express delivery model has stalled elsewhere, it has taken off in India at an unprecedented rate in the past few years as urban consumers have grown accustomed to having everything from PlayStation 5s to groceries delivered in 10 to 15 minutes.
Companies like Zepto, BlinkIt, and Instamart have them purple and poured hundreds of millions of dollars to set up “dark stores” – discrete warehouses located strategically around the neighborhood that became the hub. These companies are also hiring armies of shipping personnel as competition heats up in the booming e-commerce space.
After the meeting, BlinkIt has scrapped messaging that promises delivery within 10 minutes, and its competitors are likely to follow suit, Bloomberg said.
The news came a little more than a month later India was given legal status for millions of gig and platform workers according to the new labor law that defines gig and platform workers in the statute, and requires aggregators, such as food delivery and transportation platforms, to contribute 1% to 2% of their annual revenue (capped at 5% of payments made to these workers) to the social security fund managed by the government.
Swiggy, BlinkIt, and Zepto did not immediately return requests for comment.