The Music Man of Lucknow’s Labour Markets

In the middle of a milling crowd of labourers, Rupesh Kumar Nishad works on his laptop, which is perched on the carrier of his bicycle. Not too long ago, the 21-year-old was one of the thousands of daily wage workers who swarm Lucknow’s labour markets, such as the one at the C-Block crossing of Indira Nagar, every morning. Some of them are trained masons, plumbers, and carpenters, but a majority of people seeking employment at mazdoor mandis are semi-skilled.

Lanky and soft-spoken, Nishad came to Lucknow from Vichurpur in Chhattisgarh after finishing school to join relatives in who worked in this market. Because of a drought, he said “not a blade of grass” had grown on the family farm. Nishad first worked for ₹150 per day at a tent house, which shut down after its owner died in a road accident. The work was seasonal and the hours were long. So he came to Indira Nagar, working alongside other men from his village, and sleeping in a shanty with seven others.

While working, labourers often listen to Hindi or Bhojpuri songs on their mobiles. During downtime, they watch movies the same way. Nishad, who used to buy pirated movies and music from Bhootnath Market, sensed a unique business opportunity. “The labourers used to go to a small mobile phone kiosk to upload songs and movies, wasting their precious time. It struck me that if I could learn the basics, this could be a source of income,” Nishad said.

Three years ago, he started working as an apprentice at one of these mobile shops. Nishad purchased a second-hand laptop from the shop for ₹8,000, paying monthly installments of ₹1,000. He set himself up with a Jio internet connection and began cycling around Lucknow’s mazdoor mandis each morning, downloading movies and songs on demand. He charges ₹30 for a 4 GB download and ₹60 for 8 GB, earning about ₹250 to ₹300 a day. He sends some of his earnings home, up to ₹2,000 in a month when business is good.

“This is my business, and I enjoy it,” Nishad said, during a busy morning. People crowded around his simple workspace; a boy demanded to know why he hadn’t yet downloaded Bahubali. The discussion was interrupted by a commotion. A seth had come looking for labourers, and all the men ran towards him.

“Only 25 percent of them will get work and the rest will return dejected,” Nishad said sympathetically. “And the boss won’t pay in full. He’ll say he will make the full payment on completion of the job. He makes these people work as slaves. They are nothing but bonded labour and there is no one to save them.”

UP’s Labour Minister, Swamy Prasad Maurya, told me in an interview that 11 percent of the state’s population are daily wage labourers. Many are from neighbouring Chhattisgarh, forced from their land by drought; or from Gonda, a flood-damaged region 120km south-east of Lucknow. Mostly illiterate, those who work solo have the hardest lives, eking out a living form three or four days of work a week, cooking food on the road, and sleeping on dividers.

When they do get work, these workers might earn anywhere from ₹200 to ₹500 per day—often far below the already low minimum wage set for state government work (₹7,400 per month for unskilled labour on a construction site). No laws protect these workers, who are routinely exploited by employers and corrupt policemen.

Sonu, a labourer who learned the ropes from his father added that “the demand for labourers is going down because of real estate going into the red in the last year or so.”Demonitisation also impacted this informal market. “The government promised as the moon,” Sonu said, “but where are the achche din now?”

Nishad has no time to ponder politics. He uses his earnings to pursue a certificate course in Computers at Uptec, an institute approved by the National Skill Development Corporation. He’s focusing on the basics of hardware before signing up for a software course. As a Dalit, he only has to pay the computer fee of ₹50 per month, with tuition waived.

Yet education is no guarantee in this economy. Yogesh Chandra, another labourer, has a Bachelor of Science degree from Allahabad University. He worked in a chemical factory in Mumbai, which closed down after demonitisation. Unable to find work in Mumbai, he returned to his home town of Pratapgarh and from there came to Lucknow. “I don’t know the work of mason or plumber. But I am farmer’s son and can do menial work,” he said. “No one recognizes me here. I can’t work as a labourer at home.”

Nishad is playing it safe. Though eventually he’d like to set up a computer centre back home, he’s nurturing a more cautious dream for now: he hopes to open a utility shop in his village in the next five years, selling everything from groceries to stationary.

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