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My Thoughts About My Fieldwork Experience Essay

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Ray Le Blond has been able to consolidate my thoughts about my fieldwork experience appropriately, thus, “You learn something every day if you pay attention”. I was going to Kachra Vahatuk Shramik Sangh (KVSS), Thane as part of my fieldwork on contract labours working in Thane Municipal Corporation in Solid Waste Management Department for the second semester. Little did I know that going among the contract labours and learning about them would inspire, educate and transform me. When I was initially informed that as part of my research methodology course I would be expected to engage in field work I was equally atingled as I was timorous. Even though I had been involved in a couple of internships after my graduation, I knew this was going to be disparate. After all, this was Tata Institute of Social Sciences where everything from the DH menu to the pet dogs on campus are treated with sobriety; field work being a prerequisite would be no different. In the first week of my field work I learned that the most dominant forms of precarious work in India are contract work especially workers working in solid waste management department of municipal corporations, when workers are employed by a contractor who pays the worker their wages, and fix a direct fixed-term contracts. The term of a direct fixed-term contract can be as short as a single day. These short-term contracts are commonly known as ‘hire and fire’ contracts, as workers are under the constant threat of losing their job
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