Subcontracting of work given out to
home-based workers has been found to be
widespread in the unorganised manufacturing
sector and seems to have expanded
phenomenally over the past decade. In
almost 90 per cent of the households in
the resettlement colonies and slum areas
surveyed, at least one woman was reported
to be doing some kind of home-based
work. However, the types of jobs created
in this way are irregular and low-paid. In
the manufacturing trades (except garments),
the work is extremely irregular; the average
deployment time was less than four
months in a year. In the home-based sector,
earnings of the women workers in all trades
were abysmally low, far below the minimum
wage. The average monthly earning
in technical trades was Rs 450.