With the indefinite strike by Swiggy workers in Kochi has entered the fourth day on Thursday, the company has come out with a statement saying that it has enabled a consistent and reliable income opportunity for hundreds of delivery partners in the city.

“On average, the weekly payout of our active delivery partners in the city has increased close to 20 per cent in the last 12 months and remains industry best. We are currently speaking to delivery partners to help them understand their payouts better and encourage them to return to work. We regret the inconvenience to our users and hope to resume services soon”, the statement added.

Vipin Vincent, secretary of the Food Online Delivery Workers Union affiliated with AITUC said that the strike is continuing as the workers have held a demonstration to the Zonal office on Thursday. However, company management has called the union for talks on Friday and the progress of the strike will be decided after the meeting.

The online food delivery in the city has started facing some disruptions with the strike even though the company has deployed workers from a third party delivery partners to carry out the work, he said adding that the workers numbering around 5,000 are on strike demanding a hike in their remuneration. The intervention by the District Labour Welfare Officer for wage hike has also failed to reach a consensus, forcing the workers to go for strike.

The workers are demanding ₹35 for each delivery in a 2.5 km radius from the current rate of ₹20 for four km and ₹6 for an extra one km. They pointed out that the increase in fuel prices has now become unviable to continue the service.

The workers strike have started getting support from several quarters. Writer N S Madhavan wrote in his tweet page “The fact is that no labour laws exist for gig workers. Their working conditions are terrible, wages low and employers capricious. This strike and many more are required to establish human rights in the gig economy”.

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