This 38 years old Undergraduate (could not appear in the 3rd year exam due to financial constraint) guy is now a whole timer of Delhi Porters' Union. He is the founding general secretary of this union. And before reaching to this point he has done several works including porter's job in Lajpatrai market. He comes from the same Balia Lok Sabha constituency which the former Prime Minister Chandrashekhar represents.

During his school days (1978) he came into a teacher's contact, who was a marxist. He used to give him marxist literature especially on education. And thus he inclined towards the marxist ideology and joined the AISF (All India Student Federation), the student wing of Communist Party Of India (CPI) and started working for the organisation. Very soon he got several student in the organisation's fold and started agitations on different issues of student's interest in his school.

After leaving the school he joined AIYF, the youth wing of CPI and continued his struggle on the slogans like "bekaron ko kam do ya bekari bhatta do". He was so active in the organisation that he was elected as the president of Balia district committee of the organisation. And at the same time he was given the full membership of the party and also he got a seat in the District executive committee of the party.

After that the party gave him the responsibility of organising 'Kisan aur khetihar mazdoor'. But this time his had some bais against 'Kisans' because he himself was from a landless background. Although he started bearing the responsibility given by the party but agricultural labourer and their sufferings was on his priority. During those days he fought several struggles for the wage reform and other caste based discriminatins and in course of that he went to jail also, "ek bar 7 doston ke sath hume jhuthe mukadme ke karan jail jana pada ek saptah ke liye. But he is pleased that the labourers got some relief due to those struggles, their wage increased and the level of caste based discrimination was also got down. "Lekin abhi bhi jati-pati aur unch-nich ke aadhar par bhedbhav hota hai aur iske liye abhi aur ladai ladne ki jaroorat hai", he says. He was so active in the party that he was elected as a member of the State executive committee of CPI.

SHIV SAGAR'S COMING TO DELHI His involvement in party activities were becoming intense day by day but at the same time his financial condition was very pitiable. And in that situation he was unable to meet the family needs. And his early marriage (in 1980) has forced him to think about his family also, because he was completely land less and there was not any source of income to family. By the time his father had already been retired from the 'Khalasi' post of railway. Occasional fishing was the only source of his family's income but that not even sufficient to meet his family's day to day expenses. On the other hand the party had not enough fund to pay him wage. That is why he started thinking of a work so that he could survive himself and his family. And thus he landed up in Delhi in 1993-94 in search of a job. And his Delhi coming proved very crucial for the working community of the Lajpatrai Market and other adjoining markets of walled city. His role is very instrumental in forming the 'Delhi Porters' Union (DPU)', 'Delhi Thela Mazdoor Sangh' and 'Dukan Karmchari Sangh'. I will discuss his role in the context of Delhi Porters' Union after a few paragraphs.

He was educated and well articulate even then he couldn't get any job for two months because he had not any hi-fi connection. The only connection he had in the city at that time was some of his villagers, who were working in the market as porters and trolley men. So he had only two options either to work as a porter or to pull a trolley. But the later one was not viable for him because he had not a single penny to purchase or hire a trolley, which was must to start with. So the only remaining option in Lajpatrai market for him was 'jhalligiri'. And for starting this work one of his villagers not only helped him in getting the badge of CREMA but he also provided him shelter also those days. So finally after 2 months some time in mid 1993 he got 468 no. badge on his arm and started carrying loads. After doing this work for one month he started contributing Rs. 50/- in the room rent. Now he lives with one of his friends in Usmanpur.

FORMATION & GROWTH OF THE DELHI PORTERS' UNION (DPU) His work was running well, after few months he had called his wife from his village to stay with him. But on one fateful day a shopkeeper (shop no. 588) and his staff beaten a jhalli. He was so badly that his nose and ear was bleeding. Shiv Sagarji says, "that time I was near shop no. 490, the jhalli came and narrated the entire story. Within few minutes around 100 jhallis assembled and we go to that particular shop and asked the reason of his beating". But the shop owner said that he had not beaten him his staff had beaten. And by the time his staff had already left the shop. So that after not getting any convincing reply form the shopkeeper, the porters gathered and blocked the main road in front of Lajpatrai market and started raising slogans against the shopkeeper. Within a few minutes SHO of the local police station reached on the spot and asked the reason of the road blockade. When the porters explained the entire incident then SHO asked them to vacate the road and invited them for discussion in the Red Fort ground. But according to Shiv Sagar, "kutch nahin hona tha aur wahi hua. Police walon ne dukandaron se moti rakam lekar mamla rafa dafa kar diya."

Next morning when Shiv Sagar came to the market his badge was taken away by the CREMA people and he was threaten not to be seen in the market, "sale netagiri karta hai, bhag ja dikhna nahin chahiye idhar". And suddenly he found himself as a baseless, in a situation working without badge was impossible. He went to jhallis and narrated the story among them. Then the jhallis requested him to not to leave the place as they need him. They promised that they would contribute money for his survival. And that workers' solidarity gave him confidence and encouraged him to fight for the workers right. Now he thought of making porters' union in the market but for doing that he felt the need of a party. Since he already was a CPI activist before coming to Delhi, so he thought to locate the local party office. Very soon he find the State office of CPI near Jama Maszid and went there and narrated the entire incident before the party office bearers.

The most important issue for him at that time was getting back his badge so that he could start his work. So that he along with his party office bearers went to the local police station Kotwali, Daryagang and narrated the badge snatching case and inquired the role of police department because 'verified by Delhi Police' is written on the badge. But the SHO said that his department has no role in issuing or taking back of badges. Then he finally lodged complaint and returned back. That complain resulted in returning of his badge. The then CREMA president Mr. Virmani and Security committee chairman Mr. Ramesh Gulati called him and returned his badge.

Now with his work he was simultaneously devoting time in organising the workers in the market. Very soon (some time in 1994) he formed Delhi Porters' Union (DPU) and registered it in the labour court with the help of his party leaders. Mr. Baljor Singh Chouhan the joint secretary of CPI was elected the founder president and Shiv Sagar was elected General Secretary. There were 1200 jhallis present at the time of first general election of DPU. After getting elected as the G. Sec. of DPU he continued porter's work for some time and then became whole timer of DPU because according to him, "union ko dekhane aur mazdooron ko organise karne ke liye jaroori tha ki koi puri tarah se kam kare aur mazdooron ne humen neta bana diya tha to humko yeh kam chodna pada."

AREA OF WORK Right now DPU has its members in Kashmere gate, Bhagirath place medicine market, Bhagirath Place electrical market, Dariba Kala Photo market and Lajpatrai market. Each of these markets have its own traders associations like PRMDA of the medicine market, BETA of electrical market, DETA of electrical market and of cource CREMA which we all are familiar with. All these market come under the DPU's area of work. and these are the area of work of DPU. There are approximately 1100 porters in Lajpatrai market and 800 of them are the member of DPU. And the average of DPU's membership in other adjoining markets are more or less same as the Lapatrai market. Any one who is carrying loads in any of the above mentioned markets can become the member of Delhi Porters' Union by giving Rs. 5 as membership fee.

FUND AND ITS EXPENDITURE According to the bye laws of DPU, the organisation will have three types of funds. First the fund collected by membership drive, second organisation fund Rs. 5 per month and third another Rs. 5 for emergency or contingency fund. All these funds are meant for certain purpose. Like a certain percentage of membership fund goes to the party, while Rs. 3000/- form the organisation fund is given to the whole timer of DPU and rest amount again goes to the party. And the contingency fund is fully reserved for different type of emergency needs of the porters. Suppose a porter becomes seek and he has no money for his treatment then the DPU makes arrangement for his treatment. Similarly suppose a porter dies and none of his family member is here then DPUmakses arrangement of sending his corpse to his village or makes arrangements of his cremation locally. Similarly the DPU helps the porters on different occasions and needs.

Right now DPU has only one whole time activist that is Shiv Sagar. Being the General Secretary of organisation he has to do lot of thing. His day starts in the market by 10.30 in the morning and ends by 10-11 in the night. And during these 12-13 hours he has to go to different markets and locality to get the latest informations and developments in the market and workers lives as well. He has to listen the grievances and the problems of the porters daily and act accordingly. Besides, DPU's one of the main task is to insure safety of the market. Shiv Sagar says, "humpuri satarkta baratate hain ki market me ugravadi na aa jaye lekin market walon ko iski koi chinta hi nahin hai.

ELECTION IN DPU According to the bye laws of the organisation it is necessary to organise the general body meeting of the DPU annually. The organisation has the provision of annual election for electing the office bearers for the next one year. Shiv sagar says, "lekin Delhi Porters' Union ke ab tak ke itihas me aab tak ek bar bhi chunav ka mauka nahin aaya, sarvsammati se hath uthakar log padadhikarion ka chunav karte hain". And in case the situation arises they will elect the office bearers by majority-minority that is what he opines. Right now following are the office bearers:

Prsident: Advocate ...... (I am missing the name). He is the native of Haryana, stays in Ashok Vihar and does practice in Tis Hazari Courts General Secretary: Shiv Sagar, a native of Balia, UP. Comes form a land less family and did several kinds of labouring. Secretary: Madan, a native of Bihar and working as a porter in the Lajpatrai market. Treasurer: Gulab from UP. He also works in the market.

PORTERS' / WORKERS' PROFILE

WHO JOINS & WHO LEAVES Right now whoever is working as the porter in the market, has started this work as his first job in Delhi. Its main reason is that only those people come and join this work who is illiterate, unskilled and rough and tough. They already know their limitations that they can not do any other job, and especially the sophisticated ones. Another reason is that this is not a kind of 'naukari'. They are free to do this work according to their will. No body will force them to do it or no body will ask the account of their absence from the work place or did not they work on any particular day. And according to Shiv Sagar this is only because first of all this is a tough work and at the same time this is not a 'naukari', so that doing this work people enjoy certain type of independence. As far as leaving of this job is concerned, 10 % people leave the job annually. This happens only in two cases, either some body dies or returns to his home / village or start some small set up of his own. Otherwise people work here up to the age of 40-45 years. Generally people of 19 to 45 years of age does the porter work.

REGIONAL AND COMMUNITARIAN BACKROUND Almost all the porters are from eastern UP and Bihar. The poorest of poor section of the community from Ghajipur, Jaunpur, Ajamgadh, Dewaria, Balia, Gorakhpur and Sultanpur districts from UP and Saharsa, Madhubani, Darbhanga, Samastipur, Muzaffarpur, Siwan, Chhapra, Baxar, Bhojpur and Aara district from Bihar come to the market for their livelihood and carry load on their heads. Besides a few all of them are form backward and scheduled castes. The UP component of the porters and trolley man are largely from 'Bind (fisher man community)' caste. This land less community live on the bank of rivers and traditionally engaged in boat sailing and fishery and agricultural labouring. Somewhere even they are working as bonded labourers. Very few of them are in government job. That way their economic condition is very bad and in the absence of viable economy their educational standard is also very low. According to Shiv Sagar, "yeh log naw chalate hain, kaide se to inko jal sena me reservation milna chahiye tha, lekin inki jati ke netaon ne inke saath daga kiya hai jiske karan aaj yeh log jhalliwale ka kam kar rahe hain". And all these are the factors of their migration form their respective places.

As far as the Bihar component of the porters are concerned, a large section of them comes from Saharsa district and these are Yadavs, the fraternal caste of Chief minister Mrs. Rabri Devi alias Mrs. Laloo Prasad Yadav. Unlike their UP counterpart they have some land and have their substantial representations in Government jobs, even some of them are in bureaucracy also. In spite of that it is a fact that a seizable section of this community is today carrying loads in the market. Besides Yadavs, there are some people from S Cs and Rajputs and Brahmins are also engaged in labouring activities in the market. But the number of Rajputs and Brahmins are very few and working of these people as labourers is not considered good in their community. Here is an example of a Brahmin porter, who is working in Bhagirath Place. He left his home in Baxar district after a quarrel with his family 2-3 years ago. After coming Delhi he started working as a porter in the electrical market with the help of his fisher man villagers. Now his family members sees his porter work as a disrespect to them. Last Wednesday his elder brother who is in Indian Air Force had come to persuade him to leave this low standard work. The elder brother was saying to him, "chala ganve me rahiha, tora ke koi gadi udi kharid diyai. Apan dekhbhal kariha". So this example is enough to understand the less number of upper caste people in this work and how this work is not considered as disrespectful.

TYPES OF LABOURING There are approximately 5 thousand workers, spread in four different markets in the walled city area. They are doing different kinds of laboring works there. Sagarji broadly divides them under following categories:

1. Porter: who carry load on their head, 2. Trolley Puller: Who deliver mall on trolley from one point to other, 3. Trolley helper (dhakka lagane wallah): who help the trolley man through pushing the trolley when it requires, 4. Contractors: Shiv sagar says him 'dalal' also. Their main work to take the contracts of delivering goods to the transporters from the shopkeepers. 5. Packagers: who do packaging works and lastly 6. Attendants: These are the people who work in shops and stores (godwns) and looks after the safety of the goods and besides, do several other necessary works.

WAGE Wage was always the point of confrontation between the shopkeepers and the workers in the market. There was not any wage policy in the entire history of the market. Shopkeepers always use to give wages according to their own terms and conditions. What you are looking today in the name of wage is at least 10-15 years old. The traders associations have fixed the wage according to their own terms and conditions. In Lajpatrai market it is Rs. 3 per round, which is even less than the price of a cup of tea. They do not take account of the distance and the weight of commodity. If a jhalli has to deliver goods to a shop in the lane of 600 or in the back side of the market he will get the same Rs. 3 for one round. Whether the weight is 5 kg or 50 kg, it does not matter; wage will be the same rs. 3 per round. After several rounds of struggles and agitations the workers got the present wage Rs. 3 per round in 1996-97 otherwise it was Rs. 1.50 earlier. Shiv Sagar has kept the documents of those struggles very carefully and he is ready to make those public at least for me. He says, "mazdoori ko lekar 10-15 badi-badi hadtalen hui hongi, chhoti-moti ki to koi ginti hi nahin hai." He recalls the strike of 1996 as one of the biggest strkes. At that time the CREMA had negotiated with the workers in the police station Kotwali before the SHO. Right now the wage rate is as follows:

Lajpatrai Market to Lajpatrai Market ........ Rs. 3/- per round Lajpatrai Market to Anguri Bagh .............. Rs. 7/- per round Lajpatrai Market to Cycle maket ............... Rs. 5/- per round Lajpatrai Market to Bhagirath place .......... Rs. 5/- per round

In case the outstation traders engage them some times they give the same rate fixed by the market associations and sometimes even less than that. Some times they ask porters to delver the goods to railway stationa and offer the wage fixed for the cycle market and in that case if the porters object and ask for more then they complain the incident to the concerned associations, which results in the exploitation of workers. They are asked to submit their badges, and fraud cases are lodged in the police station.

DRESS Like the badge the history of dress is also untressable, but certainly it is not very old. According to Sagar, "iski shuruat bhi badge ke shuruat ke aas-pass hi hui hogi. But todays dress code is fixed by the traders associations of different markets. There are four colours of dresses are in practice in the market. Labourers of Each market have to wear different colour shirt / kurta. Porters of Bhagirath place medicine market wears red shirt, Lajpatrai market porters wear blue, electrical market people wear green while the Bhagirath place electronics market people has to wear saffron. And the workers have to manage the dress of their own. And it is very difficult for these workers to work without proper dess i. e., shirt / kurta and badge tied on their arms.

BADGES The story of badges in the market is 20-25 years old. First of all there was a man called Bhagat in the market. He was very concerned about the workers and their working conditions. That is why he started to organise the workers in the market. According to Shiv Sagar and some of the old porters in the market he was the first person in the market who tried to organise the workers. Those were the days when shopkeepers in the market began to complain of theft of their goods by the workers. And those were the days when exploitation of workers started in the name of theft. So that Bhagat not only started organising the workers but also started making badges of his own and distributed among the workers in the market. But hardly any one knows of his initiatives and that is why now it is difficult to trace Bhagat's relationship with the traders association. "Lekin Bhagat ko badge chala, kafi dinon tak chala market me", says Shiv Sagar. The formalisation of badges started in the tenure of DCP Ms. Kiran Bedi in these market. First of all she distributed badges among the porters of Delhi Electrical Market in Bhagirath Place. She used to distribute badges on the spot. Her badge distribution system was very simple. She used to call the porters and ask, "badge chahiye? Chahiye to jaldi se photo khinchwao aur jama karo", says Shiv Sagar's old friends. Not only that, she even used to send the details of workers to their respective villages. But the shopkeepers / traders associations made the badges irrelevant very soon and started their own badges.

Today all the traders associations issue badges to the porters. Except the badges issued by CREMA all the badges have written P S KOTWALI over them. The CREMA badge has the text '...... verified by Delhi Police'. But the fact is that none of these badges are verified by DP and in fact D P has no role in issuing of badges. Shiv Sagar says, "police ko moti rakam dekar yeh traders associations manmane dhang se badges bechte hain". Here he specifically uses the term 'bechte hain' because the porters are charged certain amount for the badges which vary from market to market. Right now it is Rs. 150 in the Lajpatrai Market. They (traders associations) do not give application forms to the new public. They always ask at least 2 guranter, which is not easy to manage for a new or unknown persons. And any how if he manages the guranters then they are asked to fill up an application with 4 passport size photographs and deposit certain fees. But as far as the verification is concerned, no verification is done at all. "Its verification procedure is so week that any body, even the ISI people can manage to have a badge with the conivance of any market people", says Shiv Sagar and his friends. According to him the number of such porters in the market is also very high, who work without badges and some times takes away the malls. And in that situation the authorised porters are blamed for that theft and the market people exploit them. And surprisingly the shopkeepers do no to the police station for complaining the theft because "kaise jayenge FIR likhwane kyonki inka sara ka sara kam 2 number ka hota hai, kisi tarah ka tax nahin dete hain yeh log apni bikri par" says Shiv Sagar. According to him every day trade of lakhs and lakhs rupees are done illegally in the market. They do not give original receipts of transactions and sales, all are done on the fraud receipts. For example, they send / book mall on the receipts of some 'Mohan Electronics' while there is not any shop of such name. And Shiv Sagar says, "this practice is going on large scale in the market".

Every year or after two years they change the shape and style of the badge. Shiv Sagar says, "koi jhalli agar market me 20 salon se kam kar raha hai aur yadi who yah batana chahata hai apne badge ke madhyam se to who nahin bata payega kyonki uska record CREMA nahin rakhti hai. Har sal uska form far diya jata hai ya jala diya jata hai aur naye form par photo chipka diya jata hai unka". And thus it is really very difficult for a jhalli to prove his work duration through the so called authorised badge. I have seen three different types of badges issued by different traders association which are as follows:

1. AUTHORISED PORTER's NO. ...................

verified by CREMA & DELHI POLICE

2. POLICE STATION NO. ........ P.R.M.D.A. PORTER KOTWALI

3. DELHI TRADERS ASSOCIATION P. S. KOTWALI PORTER NO. ............

Shiv Sagar says after a long struggle he became successful in continuing the badges issued by Kiran Bedi in different markets.This is not the end of badges story. Whenever and wherever the market people (shopkeepers) thinks takes away the porters badges. Whenever the porters raise voise against their exploitation, first thing the CREMA does is that it snatch away the badge. And if the porters go to the police station then they were said that their record is not in the police station and it is not the jurisdiction of police to handle such cases. Thus badge has become like the source of live and the reason of death for the workers in these markets.

THEIR LOCAL SHALTERS All the workers live in different J J clusters and colonies in different working class localities of Delhi and they do not have even bare minimum facilities. Most of them live on rent, only 25 % of them have their own jhuggi, otherwise they spend average Rs. 100/- on rent. 5-5, 6-6 people live in one room, which has hardly any ventilation. There is not any proper drinking water facility for them. As far as the sanitation and cleanliess is concerned, it is meaningless for the workers. They use open space for toilet. The major chunk of workers live in Indira Colony near Yamuna Pusta behind Vijay Ghat. And the main residents of this basti are Saharsa's Yadavs. In fact this is like their commune. Second most feverable destination of these workers are Khajuri, Usmanpur, Sonia Vihar in the trans Yamuna area. These three are partly juggis and partly resttlement colonies. Mostly the UP component of workers lives in Usmanpur while Sonia Vihar and Khajuri have both Bihari and UP migrants. Third working class locality is Loni in Gaziabad district, UP. This is the second most fevourable place of residence of market's labourers as they get cheap accomodations in this locality. Again Both Bihari and UP workers live there. And the fourth and the last 'thikana' of porters is Madanpur Khadar near Okhla, which is again a big J J cluster.

COMMUTATION Besides the people who live in Yamuna Pusta all the workers travel at least 10 kilometers to reach at their work place. Half of the labour force has to travel even more than 25 kilometers daily to reach at their work place. And it can easily be understood that they have to spend a substantial time only on commuting. It means that their day must start by 5-6 O' clock in the morning. The people from Yamuna Pusta come to the market through walk or by rickshaw because they are very near to the market. While the people from trans Yamuna come to the market by passenger auto, bus and cycle. The Loni people come by train and bus both but the train commuters are more than the bus wallahs. And in case they could not get the train on time then it becomes very difficult for them to reach at their respective work place, which further results in the loss of their 'dihadi (daily earning)' of that particular day. Madanpur Khadar people have only one option of commutation that is bus.

SOURCE OF ENTERTAINMENT Entertainment has very important place in human life. In every era people had different sources of entertainment, whether it is nautanki, bhajan-kirtan, games & sports or 'mujara', music and cinema; people used / use these sources according to the accessibility. Even poor people in the villages use bhajan-kirtans or some easy way of entertainment. But there is no place for entertainment in the porters' lives. "After such an exhaustive and tiring work who thinks of entertaining, and in case any body thinks then watches T V or listen folk and film music on decks", says Sagar. He categorically rejects that his community ever go to prostitutes unlike rickshaw pullers or other working class community to fulfill their sexual needs.

EDUCATION Although some graduates are also working as a porter in the market but it is a true that their educational average far below the national average. According to Shiv Sharan 50 % of them are illiterate, 10 % have got education upto middle standard, 15% are educated up to high school, 10 % up to the intermediate and 5 % are graduates.

NECESSARY GOVERNMET DOCUMENTS We all know that this is the era of increasing surveillance. Every one has to prove that he / she is the legal resident of any particular locality / city / country otherwise it will hardly take any time for him to be declared as an anti national, a member of any terrorist organisation or an ISI agent. That is why consumer ration card, election identity card, driving license, etc are considered as necessary documents of proof. But if believe Shiv Sagar any time these porters can be branded as anti nationals or terrorists because very few of them have any of these documents. According to him only 10% of the city porters have the ration card while the number of election card holder is negligible, only 1 % porter have the E I D. Forget the driving license, very few of them have knowledge that this is also considered as an important document of prove.

INTERNAL FIGHTINGS AMONG THE PORTERS Shiv Sagar's opinion is that the internal fightings among the workers is one of the major reason of their plight. They do not understand the work logic and their own needs. There are several reasons of their infighting. Suppose two porters are from the same village and both have some familiar problems there, now what they do here is that both starts looking the proper timings to teach a lesson to each other. And Shiv Sagar says this is as the biggest hurdle in workers' unity. Another reason of their enemity is the 'theha (seat or space)'. "They start fighting merely on the issue of space, "mere theha par tum kaise aa gaye bahancho...", says Shiv Sagar. But the most important factor of enemity among the porters is that some offers to do the work on lesser wage and this according to Sagar is enough to create tension between the worker community.

FESTIVALS Most of them go to their respective villages in the traditional festivals like Holi and Chhatother. But beside these they celebrate May day in full spirit. On that day they do not work and organise a big function in the market and also join the central program organised by different trade unions in Ramlila Maidan. They start form the market as a procession and go the Ramlila Maindan and in the returning they assemble in front of the Town Hall and do public meeting. Some times they celebrate independence day also in the market. But they say that the Mad day is the most important festival for them and they speaks very extensively about the concept of this day.

THEIR FAMIIES They are very poor and that is why they have migrated to this place in search of their livelihood. According to Sagar most of these workers are the main bread earners of their families and they have to look after their entire families comprising of father-mother, wife and children. And you have just read about their accomodations and their conditions of stay. In that case it is very difficult for these workers to keep his family with them. So that largely their family members are in their respective villages and they sends money to them regularly. But hardly any porter use the post office, they send money through their villagers. And another thing is that most of the porters go to their villages after every 3-4 months for 10-15 days and that way they take money with them also. Only 20% porters keep their family with them.

PROBLEMS OF PORTERS IN THE MARKET The first and the biggest problem of the porters is that they are not independent with their badges or it can be better said as the porters have no right over their badges. Shiv Sagar says, "agar koi jhalli wallah yah chahe ki apni gair maujudgi me, jaise ki man lijiye who bimar pad gaya ya ghar ja raha hai to apna badge kisi ko de de to who aisa nahin kar sakta hai, jhalli walon ko aisa karne ka koi adhikar nahin deta hai CREMA". Secondly, the porters are not given even 5 paise medicine by the shopkeepers in case of accident. He says, "suppose a porter falls with his loads and got his leg fractured or got some other injury then he will not be paid for treatment rather will be asked to give compensation for the loss and wear and tear of goods." Thus the shopkeepers are termed as 'rakshasa' by him. He sites one example of porter-beating. In 1996-97 some shop keepers had beaten a porter and after that called the police and lodged complaint against that jhalliwallah with 7 others and that case is still under trial in Tis Hazari Courts. Thirdly, every now and then the shopkeepers snatch away the badges of porters and it can be easily imagined that without badges their lives remains more than the fish without water.

Another important problem they face is that they haven't any solid prove of their identity that they are working in the market. "Even when the letters come form their homes then the shopkeepers do not inform him because if any body gets a letter on the address of any particular shop then that will be his prove, which he can use in case of emergency", says Shiv Sagar and his friends. One of shiv sagar friend says, "agar baris hone lage to humlogon ke sir chhupane ke liye bhi koi jagah nahin hai market me". Similarly one porter, who comes form Loni by train says that in case we can not get train there is not any source of commutation from such a far place to the market and not reaching to the market or late coming means loss of wage of that particular day. Thus the life of porters is full of problems and they know it well that no body will help them to resolve them except the DPU.