Blue & Grey collar workers are basically the employees who handle manual labour. They do both skilled and unskilled work on a daily wage or hourly paid basis. And this article focuses on the condition of blue and grey collar workers in India. Because this section of the category is the largest workforce of India that deals with various issues with no clear solution.

In India, there are around 300-400 million blue-collared workers, who mostly work in the logistics/supply chain, manufacturing and retail sector. And the numbers are increasing with the growing economy, urbanisation and declining agriculture employment. Millions of school and college students join this sector due to a lack of employability skills for white-collar jobs. People migrate from different states to metropolitan cities like Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, to seek better job opportunities. But they face challenges in accessing correct jobs due to poor organisation and information.

THE CHALLENGES:

Unorganised setup:

Blue and grey collar workers function in an unorganised sector, with no set working hours and job security. They work for several hours inhumanely. There is no 9 to 5 concept for these workers. They toil round-the-clock to complete their labour. Some workers work under zero-hour contracts that provide no fixed working hours. It is an unstructured system, sometimes they work regularly and on other days they might long for their next work.

Underpaid:

In terms of economic power, they come at the lower bar of society. As these workers in India are the most underpaid sector. But with personal commitments like the financial expenses of family and children, they continue to toil for a few pennies. Because it can hugely impact their capacity to buy even the basic necessities like food, clothing and shelter. And the fear of losing income makes them desperate to find jobs in any harsh conditions.

Fraudulent contractors:

In their desperation to get some work, many workers fall prey to fraudulent contractors. These contractors work as middlemen, who assure to find work for these workers. Instead, blue and grey-collar workers get exploited by these contractors. They charge a big amount of commission to find jobs for workers but don’t guarantee consistent job opportunities. Therefore, workers remain without any work most of the time. So, there is a huge gap between job seekers and employers which is creating such a situation.

Lack of skills to cope with automation:

There are two sets of beliefs over the transitioning of industries toward automation. One, who believes it ultimate damages job opportunities, as machines will replace humans. The second set believes that it may affect the job market for human labour for a short duration. But it will create large opportunities for new and much better jobs for humans. Both these arguments can not be ignored because the change can surely bring better job prospects but for that, extensive skill training is equally a need of the hour. Otherwise, the former belief might prevail.

THE OPPORTUNITIES:

Increase in job opportunity post-Covid19:

Recent reports clearly indicate growth in blue-collar jobs in the second half of 2021. During the surge of Covid19, there was a steep fall in employment. And Blue-collar workers were the worst-hit section in the market. After the gradual decline of covid19, companies are gradually increasing their business and leading to a new normal environment. Therefore, the demand for blue-collar workers is increasing by even 4% more than the pre-Covid19 period in 2019 and 37% from 2020.

The emergence of the gig economy:

India has seen a tremendous increase in app-based services in the market in the last five years. Now, it is considered as the largest gig economy centre in the world. Companies like Uber, Zomato, UrbanClap, etc. need people for home delivery, repair services, cab driving etc. Hence, the demand for blue-collar workers has increased in the logistics and e-commerce sectors immensely.

Technology as a solution: Online recruitment

Looking at the surge in demand for blue-collar workers doesn’t mean that job seekers are fully aware of the job vacancies and know the correct direction to access suitable jobs for them. There is a false dearth because of scattered or missing pieces of information about job availability in the market. The lack of information is created due to no dedicated platform that mediates or works to bring both parties together. Most of the job applications in the market cater to white-collar jobs.

ShramIN App:

Here we introduce you to the ShramIn App that creates a suitable ecosystem for Blue and Grey collar workers and employers. It is a free portal for both job seekers and employers. On one hand, employers can post unlimited job postings for free, and on the other jobseekers can post their resumes for free as well. We understand, after the pandemic, hiring has become an issue for MSMEs. Because it is difficult for them to afford to advertise job openings on their websites. And we want to bridge the employment gap among blue and grey collar workers by eliminating the role of any middleman or placement cell. Transparency of pay scale and other details given by the recruiter neglects any chance of labour exploitation.

Till now, there are more than 25,000+ skilled candidates on ShramIN Jobs App.

Download the ShramIN Recruit app to hire the best talent for your organization. If you want to know about the top blue collar jobs in demand then click on the link :- https://www.shramin.com/blog/top-blue-collar-jobs-in-demand