Gig worker

Topic: Employment, Unemployment and Informalisation · NCERT: Beyond NCERT

Meaning

A gig worker is a person who works and earns money outside the traditional employer-employee relationship. They are paid per task, trip or project, and there is no fixed employer, salary or permanent contract. Example: a freelance designer paid per task.

• Why it matters: gig work is one of the fastest-growing forms of work in India. The Code on Social Security, 2020 was the first Indian law to define it, and the Code came into force on 21 November 2025 [1].
• Funding formula (for gig and platform worker welfare):
• Aggregator contribution = the lower of (1-2% × annual turnover) and (5% × amount paid or payable to gig and platform workers) [1]

Explanation

How gig work differs from a regular job

• Regular employee: has a fixed employer, a contract, fixed hours and benefits such as paid leave and provident fund (PF, a savings fund for retirement).
• Gig worker: has no single employer.
• They are paid per piece of work (a delivery, a ride, a design job).
• They can choose when and how much to work.

• But they usually get no paid leave, no pension and no health cover from the firm.

• Result: the worker gets flexibility but little income security. In practice this puts much gig work close to the unorganised sector (small, scattered work mostly outside government control, low-paid and irregular).

Types: gig worker, platform worker and aggregator

• Gig worker: the broad group. Anyone earning outside the employer-employee relationship.
• Platform worker: a gig worker who finds customers or clients through an online platform. Examples: food-delivery riders, cab drivers on ride-hailing apps.

• Key rule: every platform worker is a gig worker, but not every gig worker is a platform worker.

• Aggregator: a digital intermediary or marketplace (an app or website) that connects buyers of a service with the people who provide it. Examples: Zomato, Swiggy, Uber, Ola, Urban Company [1].

What makes gig work grow

• Organised jobs grow slowly. New workers cannot find formal jobs, so they take gig work.
• Firms cut costs. Hiring per task avoids the cost of labour law duties such as PF and leave.
• Apps make matching easy. A phone connects a rider to a customer in seconds.
• Job polarisation: jobs grow at the low-skill and high-skill ends while the middle shrinks. In India's gig workforce in 2020-21 [3]:
• Medium-skilled: about 47%
• Low-skilled: about 31%
• High-skilled: about 22%
• The medium-skilled share is falling, and the low- and high-skilled shares are rising [3].

Worked example: the aggregator's contribution

• A delivery app has an annual turnover of ₹1,000 crore. The government notifies a rate of 2%.

• Turnover route: 2% × 1,000 = ₹20 crore.

• The app pays its riders ₹300 crore in the year.

• Cap route: 5% × 300 = ₹15 crore.

• The app pays ₹15 crore, because that is the lower figure.

• Why the cap exists: an app with a large turnover but few gig workers is not charged an unfair amount.

In India

• Law: the Code on Social Security, 2020 defines "gig worker", "platform worker" and "aggregator" for the first time. It came into force on 21 November 2025 [1].

• The Unorganised Workers' Social Security Act, 2008 is now subsumed (absorbed) into this Code.

• Social Security Fund:

• Aggregators pay 1-2% of annual turnover. The payment is capped at 5% of the amount paid or payable to gig and platform workers [1].
• A National Social Security Board oversees schemes for gig and platform workers.

• Schemes cover life and disability cover, accident insurance, health and maternity benefits, and old-age protection [1].

• Size (NITI Aayog report "India's Booming Gig and Platform Economy", June 2022):

• 77 lakh gig workers in 2020-21. That was 2.6% of the non-agricultural workforce and 1.5% of the total workforce [2][3].

• Projected to reach 2.35 crore by 2029-30, which would be 6.7% of the non-agricultural workforce and 4.1% of total livelihoods [2][3].

• e-Shram (2021): a national database of unorganised workers. Each worker gets an e-Shram UAN (Universal Account Number, one ID that goes with them everywhere).

• 31.42 crore registrations as of 22 December 2025 [4].
• An earlier 2025 count was 30.68 crore+, with women at 53.68% [5].
• An aggregator module was launched on 12 December 2024. Aggregators use it to register themselves and their platform workers [1].

• 12 major aggregators have been onboarded, including Zomato, Swiggy, Uber, Ola, Blinkit, Zepto, Rapido, Amazon and Urban Company [1][6].

• Budget 2025-26 promised three things for online platform workers [6]: 1. registration on e-Shram; 2. identity cards; 3. health cover under Ayushman Bharat PM-JAY (the government's hospital-insurance scheme).

• The Standing Finance Committee approved the PM-JAY extension on 18 March 2025 [6].

• Other routes to cover: PM-SYM (2019) is a contributory pension (the worker pays in each month) that pays ₹3,000 a month from age 60. There is also the Atal Pension Yojana (2015) and wider ESIC coverage.

• State laws for platform workers: Rajasthan (2023) and Karnataka (2025), among others.

Don't confuse with

• Platform worker: a subset of gig workers. The difference is whether the work comes through an online platform. A freelance designer found by word of mouth is a gig worker but not a platform worker.
• Employee: has an employer-employee relationship and full labour rights (minimum wage, leave, PF). India's Code does not make gig workers employees. It creates a separate third category with social security only.
• Casual worker: hired day by day with no contract, mainly in construction, trade and transport. This is traditional unorganised work, with no legal "gig" definition and no aggregator fund.
• Aggregator: the app or company (the intermediary), not the worker. The aggregator pays into the Social Security Fund.

Prelims Hooks

• "Gig worker", "platform worker" and "aggregator" were first defined in law by the Code on Social Security, 2020, which came into force on 21 November 2025 [1].
• Trap: every platform worker is a gig worker, but not every gig worker is a platform worker.
• Aggregator contribution = 1-2% of annual turnover, capped at 5% of the amount paid or payable to gig and platform workers [1].
• NITI Aayog (June 2022): 77 lakh gig workers (2020-21), rising to 2.35 crore (2029-30). That is 1.5% → 4.1% of the total workforce [2][3].
• e-Shram aggregator module launched on 12 December 2024. Budget 2025-26 extended PM-JAY health cover to platform workers registered on e-Shram [1][6].
• ILO Convention No. 193 (2026), adopted at the 114th International Labour Conference, is the first international labour standard for the platform economy [7].

Mains Points

• Social security without employee status:
• India's Code gives gig workers a welfare fund paid for by aggregators. It does not give them a minimum wage or protection from unfair dismissal.
• The UK Supreme Court's Uber ruling (2021) held that drivers are "workers" with a minimum wage and paid holiday.
• ILO C193 (2026) says platform workers should have union rights, protection from discrimination, child labour and forced labour, and a safe workplace, whatever their employment status [8].

• GS-III trade-off: flexibility for platforms and job creation versus income security for workers.

• Algorithmic management (the app, not a human manager, sets pay, targets and ratings):

• Apps can deactivate (block) a worker with no human review or appeal.
• Workers often cannot see how their pay is calculated.

• This calls for grievance redressal, human review and transparency rules, plus minimum-earnings and heat-stress protection for delivery riders (GS-II: governance of platforms).

• The gap between registration and benefits:

• e-Shram has 31.42 crore registrations (December 2025) [4], but registration alone gives the worker nothing.
• Benefits reach workers only when the ID is linked to PM-JAY, PM-SYM, APY and ESIC.
• Portability (keeping benefits when changing job, employer or state), through tools like the UAN and One Nation One Ration Card, is essential because gig workers change jobs and places often.

Related concepts

• Landless agricultural labourers
• Small and marginal farmers
• Platform worker
• Universal social security
• Portability of benefits

Read more

• Protecting unorganised, gig and platform workers