Scaffolds of Neglect : Evaluating Labor Laws and Judicial Remedies for Injured inter-State Migrant Building Workers

Abstract

The building workers are highly in demand in the developing society due to the rapid horizontal and vertical expansion of modern urban infrastructure. It relies heavily on the physical labor of building workers. Despite driving macroeconomic growth, the building workers are migrating to different parts in search of their skillful work. These marginalized inter-state migrant building workers remain disproportionately vulnerable to severe workplace occupational hazards, injuries, and fatalities. At their workplaces they are facing several injuries that are not properly compensated . Thus highly informal, multi-tiered subcontracting networks operations are routinely faced by the injured migrant building workers who face systemic deprivation, including the denial of employment proof, immediate medical abandonment, coerced low-value cash settlements, and the sudden economic destitution of their dependent families.
This paper critically evaluates the efficacy of the existing statutory frameworks specifically the Building and Other Construction Workers (BOCW) Act, 1996, the Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, 1979, and the nascent Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020—against the realities of field-level enforcement. It further analyzes the proactive role of the judiciary, which has consistently read the right to safe working conditions into the fundamental Right to Life under Article 21 of the Constitution. However, a persistent chasm remains between progressive statutory jurisprudence and the institutional implementation. This study argues that the current legal architecture acts as a "scaffold of neglect," failing to protect building workers due to non-portable welfare benefits, systemic non-registration, and weak penal enforcement against principal employers. The paper concludes by proposing structural reforms that includes the mandatory digitization of labor data via the e-Shram portal linked to municipal building sanctions, the institutionalization of universal benefit portability, and the enforcement of strict strict-liability safety audits to secure institutional dignity and legal redress for the builders of modern cities.

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