Heat relief: Let street vendors and labourers guide action plans

livemint.com:

₹500-600 every day. The situation is worse for those who come from marginalized communities. Ajay Kumar Gautam, a researcher, in his work, ‘Unveiling Layers of Struggle: Caste, Gender, and Precarity Among Indian Street Vendors,’ reveals caste discrimination among street vendors.

Besides this, they have to battle multiple health-related issues: anxiety, irritability, sleeplessness, fatigue, and, among other things, frequent headaches. Their monthly expenditure has also sharply increased, exacerbating their economic uncertainties. Most times, they are unable to even seek proper medical care because of financial constraints.

Regarding emergency healthcare, almost a fifth of the vendors surveyed reported that they could not afford it at all, whereas only a little over a quarter said they could bear the cost of healthcare without jeopardizing other household necessities. Heed the Supreme Court: Despite the recent Supreme Court ruling that protection from extreme climatic conditions is a basic human right, the implementation of this on the ground level is yet to materialize. The street vendor community demands certain protective measures from the state, such as medically-equipped health shelters, washroom facilities in market zones, and access to clean drinking water.

These facilities are crucial for their well-being. The state must formulate such policies to ensure the health and dignity of street vendors. The condition of informal labourers in India is deplorable.

They live very frugal lives that generate very small carbon footprints. As a consequence, their contribution to climate change is negligible. However, they suffer disproportionately whenever a climate catastrophe rocks the world.