"Bengaluru garment hub’s dirty secret: Sexual harassment in the workplace", 27 Jun 2017

...In Bengaluru, some 1,200 factories employ over five lakh women between the ages of 18 and 40. They work a gruelling eight hours to 10 hours daily, and are paid a minimum wage – under Rs 7,500 a month. But even in a sector that depends so heavily on women, sexual harassment is callously normalised and poorly addressed. Recruitment practices that source young women workers from distant rural villages or other states, and hostels where these workers are confined in, create an enabling environment for exploitation…

One in seven women garment workers in Bengaluru factories faces harassment. Actively prevented from unionising, underpaid and overworked, the largely rural-origin, barely school-educated women workers are not only vulnerable to verbal and sexual abuse within the factory, but are also less likely to protest and receive redressal….

Companies seemed more compliant when the brands they supplied were strict regarding sexual harassment. A Stockholm-based media officer of the Swedish clothing multinational H&M wrote on email that its Indian suppliers needed to have “a policy on Anti-harassment and Anti-abuse practices”, which their sustainability teams monitor. A communications officer for Dutch fashion brand C&A emailed to say that the brand was formulating internal guidelines to address working conditions, with a focus on violence against female workers. In the past five years, other global brands like Gap Inc, Primark and Walmart have launched broader initiatives on women’s empowerment, through health and life skills programmes…