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Employment and Dignity Under Beneficial Owners of Information, Automatic Identification and Surveillance Technology:India's First Mass Surveillance, Mass Spying Unending Census Case-Part 21
Written By mediavigil on Tuesday, October 27, 2026 | 12:08 AM
Connectivity in this context is defined as the use of the Internet by individuals. “Universal connectivity” means connectivity for all. “Meaningful connectivity” is a level of connectivity that allows users to have a safe, satisfying, enriching and productive online experience at an affordable cost. The two dimensions are complementary: neither universal connectivity with poor quality nor meaningful connectivity for the few will yield significant, society-wide benefits. At the same time, the two dimensions obviously reinforce each other: more use can lead to more meaningful connectivity, and vice versa.
-Achieving universal and meaningful digital connectivity:Setting a baseline and targets for 2030, Office of the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy on Technology
Three countries account for 80% Of the cross-border e-commerce in the world: US, China and the EU. Clearly the benefits of digital economy are highly uneven and it does not serve all people equally. Under the current configuration of policies, rules, market dynamics and corporate power, economic gaps are likely to increase.
-The E-Commerce Moratorium: Scope and Impact, Joint Communication from India and South Africa dated March 10, 2020, Work Programme On Electronic Commerce, WTO
Introduction
The question:“Are we all going to be working for a smart machine, or will we have smart people around the machine?” raises the oldest political questions about knowledge, authority, power and human dignity.
According to the latest estimate from UN, half of the world’s population, currently do not have access to the Internet. A total of 1.06 billion cellular mobile connections were active in India in towards the beginning of 2026, which was 72.5 percent of the total population. A significant number of these connections refers to only services such as voice and SMS, and does not include access to the internet. There were 1.03 billion individuals using the internet in India at the end of 2025, when online penetration stood at 70 percent. India was home to 500 million social media user identities in October 2025, which is 34.1 percent of the total population. Some 440 million people in India did not use the internet at the end of 2025. 30 percent of the country’s population remained “offline” at the end of the 2025. One study has pointed out that low-income, high-poverty states such as Bihar rank consistently low in the digital skills index both in the rural and urban areas. It has made a case for strengthening digital infrastructure, especially in the rural areas. The Sixth National Family Health Survey (NFHS-6), conducted in 2023–24 and released by the Union Health Ministry in May 2026 shows that the country has made significant progress in women’s digital inclusion since the last survey. Indian government has revealed that as of early 2026, out of a total of 2, 64, 211 gram panchayats, over 2.15 lakh gram panchayats in the country are connected. But it is too early to ascertain the meaningful intensity of the connectivity in rural India vis-a-vis urban India and among men and women.
Prior to the arrival of smart internet connected machines, once upon a time reciprocities in employment produced and sustained reciprocities in politics because destruction of reciprocities used to result in destruction of economic gains. In that era, industrial workers could expect higher wages because whole enterprise of mass production rested upon a thriving population of mass consumers. In those times democratic measures and methods of oversight were used to assert and protect the rights and safety of workers and consumers. Legislative, regulatory, and institutional solutions used to be crafted for workers’ compensation, factory inspection,municipal trading, public utilities, food safety, child labor, and public safety. When social security measures started evaporating and unemployed and workers on low and middle incomes started experiencing the biggest decline in their living standards since reliable records began in the mid-19th Century, the social and industrial space witnessed rise in social unrest and violence of myriad shades.
The author of In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power (1988), in her book The age of surveillance capitalism: the fight for a human future at the new frontier of power (2018) touches the subject of “employment” on 25 occasions, refers to “workers” on 26 occasions and mentions “unemployment” on around five occasions.
In her 1988 book, which is a study of information technology in a work place, Shoshana Zuboff dealt with the duality of information technology as an “informating” and an automating technology; the abstraction of work associated with information technology and its related intellectual skill demands; computer-mediated work; the "information panopticon"; information technology as a challenge to managerial authority and command/control; the social construction of technology; the shift from a division of labor to a division of learning; and the inherently collaborative patterns of information work. Informating is a process that translates descriptions and measurements of activities, events and objects into information. This process makes these activities visible to the beneficial owners of the organizations. It has both an empowering and oppressing influence. This information processes are used to monitor human agency. Her research captures the shift from traditional to computer-mediated work environments in office and factory. It revealed that technology is not politically neutral. It embodies intrinsic characteristics that enable new human experiences and foreclose others. Its built environment constructs meaning, makes choices and shapes the situation of the subordinate individuals and groups to the social, political, and economic advantage of the beneficial owners. The author studied eight organizations which were moving into the "computer age" and provided crucial insights into the nature of information and its relation to reality.
Underlining the significance of this book, The Encyclopedia of Software Engineering published by London School of Economics noted the mixed blessings of technology and the forms through which technology liberates, enables, controls, erodes, enslaves and undermines the possibility of a “transparent and multivalent workplace” driven by the beneficial owners of these technologies.
What distinguishes information technology and its sister technologies like automatic identification and surveillance technologies from earlier generations of machine technology is the way it is used to reproduce, extend, and improve upon the process of substituting machines for human agency. The devices that automate by translating information into action also register data about those automated activities, thus generating new streams of information." Information technology shapes both the nature and experience of work. In the first part of the book entitled "Knowledge and Computer-Mediated Work", she underlined the possibility of beneficial owners of organizations choosing to value mechanized intelligence ignoring the human ability to make critical judgments and logical decisions. They end up transforming workers into completely dependent, unthinking automatons. In the second part entitled "Authority: The Spiritual Dimension of Power", she explores how beneficial owners can reinforce traditional, hierarchical roles, where employees are made to be subject of unquestioned obedience. In the final part entitled "Technique: The Material Dimension of Power", she had predicted a situation where technology is used to monitor employees and operations in Orwellian style. Information technology produces action and sculpts reality. She had visualized emergence of a situation where 'people serving a smart machine,' but human beings having lost the experience of critical judgment that would allow them to no longer simply respond but to know better than, to question, to say no. She was optimistic about the historic role of information technology to develop the economic and human potential of the organization.
But in The age of surveillance capitalism, Zuboff articulates her disillusionment with the questionable role of the beneficial owners of the information technology who employ relatively few people compared to their unprecedented computational resources. She underlines the historical discontinuity of the “hyperscale” business operation by comparing seven decades of employment levels and market capitalization in General Motors (GM) to post-IPO data from Google and Facebook. General Motors took four decades to reach its highest market capitalization of $225.15 billion in 1965, when it employed 735,000 women and men. GM employed more people during the height of the Great Depression than either Google or Facebook employs at their heights of market capitalization. Drawing on two papers entitled “The Fall of the Labor Share and the Rise of Superstar Firms” and “Competition at the Digital Edge: ‘Hyperscale Businesses.” She observes:”Hyperscale firms have become emblematic of modern digital capitalism, and as capitalist inventions they present significant social and economic challenges, including their impact on employment and wages, industry concentration, and monopoly.”
India’s National Policy on Information Technology, 2012 stated that "IT sector has been one of the major employment generators in the last two decades." It was projected that direct employment in the IT services and business process outsourcing (BPO) and IT enabled services segment reached 3.1 million in 2013-14 from over 2.4 million people in 2010.
Zuboff admits that not all hyperscale firms are information and surveillance capitalists but the “surveillance capitalists that operate at hyperscale or outsource to hyperscale operations dramatically diminish any reliance on their societies as sources of employees”, their employees are drawn only from the most-rarefied strata of data science.
Employment, dignity in IT, automatic identification and surveillance technology industry
Besides the employees drawn only from the most-rarefied strata of data science, “there are a lot of other people” involved in the so-called information technology (IT) industry. IT depends on computers. The use of personal computers (PCs) increased from 5.4 million PCs in 2001 to 19.6 million in 2006. Over 60 million PCs were in use in 2010. In 2010, over 2.4 million people were employed in computer related jobs. IT contributed 6.4% of the GDP of India. IT services became the fastest growing segment among export industries. The National Policy on Information Technology (NPIT), 2012 stated that “Indian IT & ITES sector employs over 2.8 million skilled people.” IT industry provided direct employment to 3.9 million people in 2017. Union government has estimated that the IT and IT enabled services industry employed 5.43 million professionals during 2023-2024, which an addition of 60,000 people over the estimate for 2022-2023. It claims that women employees account for 36% share in total industry employee base. The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has projected a requirement of around 95 lakh manpower by Indian IT industry itself by the year 2026, of which 55 lakh will be required in cloud computing, AI, big data analytics and Internet of Things etc. NASSCOM had claimed that IT industry directly employed around 51 lakh persons during 2021-22.
These claims merit quantitative and qualitative scrutiny to ascertain the job security and social security of these employees amid reports of suicides and burn out of the employees in this sector. A report entitled “Burying the burnout: Decoding the health challenges of India’s tech geniuses” by Onsurity and Knowledge Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) has found that about 43% of Indian technology workers experience health concerns related to their work, with long work hours identified as one of the major contributors to poor health. The subjugation of working class through these technologies has to be examined in the context of their deployment by the State and the non-State actors.
A doctoral thesis entitled “An Institutional Analysis of the Formation of Jobs in Software Work in the United States, 1945-2001” submitted to the Department of Management of the London School of Economics in 2015 studied four periods of the history of the IT industry. The emergence of software work and the rise of IBM (1945-1954), IBM’s dominance before the unbundling decision (1955-1969), the rise and falll of IBM (1969-1985), and the emergence of Microsoft and the burst of dotcom bubble (1985-2001).
In the first phase, the size of labor market was small and many programmers shared educational backgrounds, in the second half software workers came from very different backgrounds. Most of the software work was done by programmers, systems analysts and “a lot of other people” like support staff. In the second phase, IBM settled a case filed by U.S. Department of Justice by agreeing to separate its services division. Unlike companies like IBM, which provided employment stability, new companies offered stock options to attract and retain their programmer employees.
In the third phase, training to workers which used to be provided for free was no longer free. A significant part of the workers were trained outside universities. Initially, labor market grew because new software companies came on the scene. Software work got divided between three types of producers under three different conditions. Some firms tried to protect their workers from layoffs. Some offered stock options to attract employee’s loyalty. A bill was submitted to state-level legislatures across USA calling for the state to take the licensing of computer workers into its own hands. The bill failed in every state legislature where it was submitted because of resistance from employers. IBM faced antitrust lawsuit brought against it by U.S. Department of Justice, which was dropped 13 years later.
In the fourth phase of the study period, numerous firms left the IT industry. There was rampant layoffs. The old norms of employment security and loyalty came under stress as questioned. IBM attempted to preserve employment security through retraining and reassignment). IBM made a deal with the US legislature by which computer workers were excluded from the provisions of the Free Labor Standard Act. With the arrival of Microsoft in the personal computer software after launching Windows 3.1 and providing Windows compatible software applications, IBM abandoned its no-layoff policy. This led to end of the employment security in the IT industry. The dotcom bubble burst also led to layoffs, the labor market shrank and workers were exposed to struggle for survival. The thesis has argued that in the absence of a governmental intervention, IT corporations destabilized IT jobs and prevented the formation of a solid occupational collectivity, a precondition of institutionalization of jobs. As a consequence, there is lack of clarity as to what constitutes an IT job and who are the IT workers.
The developments in the IT sector of USA is linked to the evolution of IT sector in India although it historians of the computer age in India state that it all began in 1955 with the installation of HEC‐2M, a computer designed by A.D.Booth in England at the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) at Kolkata and with the commencement of designing and fabricating a computer at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai by R.Narasimhan’s team.
India witnessed six phases of IT, automatic identification technology and surveillance technology during 1955-2024. After the defeat in the war with China in 1962, it was realized that electronic and IT has strategic, political and economic implications. These technologies economic operators.
In the first phase, during 1955-1970, Department of Electronics was established and Electronics Corporation of India Ltd. was financed to design, develop and market computers using primarily components made in India. These computers were similar to computers made by the Digital Equipment Corporation of the USA. It is noteworthy that IBM 1620 computer of IBM, a USA based company, was installed at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur in August 1963. It was imported with financial assistance of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Prior to this the first commercial computer an IBM 1401 was installed in Mumbai at ESSO Standard Eastern Inc., an oil marketing company in 1962. It was a used computer which was dismantled in a factory in Mumbai, the worn out parts were replaced, and the machines were reassembled. The Department of Electronics was established on the recommendations of made in the report prepared by Homi Bhabha Committee on Electronics which constituted in 1963. Bhabha was chairman of Atomic Energy Commission who was killed in an air crash in 1966. Amid accusations of profiteering by IBM, by 1970, there were 80 installations of IBM 1401 but by 1971 the IBM 1401 was phased out in the USA. Out of a total of 140 computers in 1972, 124 computers installed in India in 1965. Out of which only 94 were in use in commercial undertakings, only 3 were installed after 1965 and 47 were less than 3 years old. Computerization faced resistance from the trade unions who were worried about the adverse impact of IT industry on employment in the mid 1960s.
In the second phase, during 1970-1984, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) was formed for providing software development services, for the Burroughs Corporation, USA in the absence of local markets and government policies for IT industries. The first software export zone, Santacruz Electronics Export Processing Zone (SEEPZ) was established in Mumbai in the 1970s. There were worries regarding the impact of computers on employment. The Ministry of Labour, Employment and Rehabilitation had set up a committee in 1969 under the chairmanship of R.Venkataraman, a member of the Planning Commission to examine the impact of automation on employment. The committee which was later headed by V.M. Dandekar recommended strict controls on introducing computers in industry and government departments in 1972. It made it mandatory to get prior agreement with labour before introducing computers in organizations. The committee was wary of the dominance of IBM 1401 computers which were machines primarily used for payroll processing, accounting and stores control. These labour saving machines were seen as a threat to employment. In 1975, the Public Accounts Committee of the parliament had recommended that the government should take into account the social cost of computerization. The government’s policy was that computer was to be encouraged only for those tasks which could not done manually.
The Department of Electronics (DoE) and the Electronics Commission (EC) established in 1970 were responsible for formulating policies on computers. M.G.K.Menon, the secretary of the DoE and ex‐officio chairman of the EC chose to implement the recommendations on computer development submitted by R.Narasimhan as part of the Bhabha Committee’s report of 1968. It had recommended that computers, other than the larger ones, ought to be domestically manufactured for “attaining self‐sufficiency in systems engineering and fabrication is of fundamental importance from the point of view of the defence and security of our country. P.V.S. Rao headed DoE’s panel on minicomputers had recommended that mini computers can be manufactured domestically. DoE established the National Centre for Software Development and Computing Techniques at Mumbai in 1972. Later it was renamed as the National Centre for Software Technology in 1983. National Informatics Centre was set up in 1975. DoE promoted software export publishing its first policy paper in 1974. Regional Computer Centres were set up in Pune and Chandigarh. It is noteworthy that the minicomputer policy which was announced in 1978 pursued the recommendations of the minicomputer panel. IBM which was refurbishing obsolete computers in India but when the government asked it to reduce equity and to take an Indian partner and to manufacture IBM 360 series computers, it exited from India in 1978. The Computer Maintenance Corporation was established which maintained imported computers and the computers left behind by IBM. Notably, indigenous computer/IT industry started after the departure of IBM. Prior to its exit ECIL was the only indigenous computer manufacturing company. Many Electronics Corporations were established in 1970s and 1980s to develop electronics industry in the country.
In 1980, the Electronics Commission responded to the problem of scarcity of human resources for the emerging computer industry. In 1982, a panel on Computer Manpower Development recommended expansion of the undergraduate programmes in Computer Science at IITs and other engineering colleges and to start Master of Computer Applications (MCA). These measures contributed to the growth of software services industry in India. In 1982, the use of microprocessor based electronic voting machines (EVMs) happened for the first time in a bye election to the Indian Parliament held in Kerala. The EVM was designed by two public sector companies: the Bharat Electronics Ltd., and the ECIL, for easy use by the illiterate electorate. The use of EVMs allowed the declaration of election results within two days after voting.
In the third phase, during 1984-1991, government policies were changed for the IT sector post mid 1980s. Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT) was established in 1984 after the adoption of New Computer Policy for increased productivity and economic development. The planners projected a market of Rs 10, 000 crore for the computer industry with a Rs 1, 000 crore software export market. The policy allowed the import of fully assembled motherboards with processors and reduced import duties. This led to a sharp reduction of price and a speedier spread of computer use. After the adoption of Software Policy in 1986 software companies were allowed to import computers at reduced import duty rates to enable them to export software. Software development was recognized as an industry which deserved several tax concessions. Government felt that “import of technology could accelerate national development in the field of electronics and computer”. The policy announcements like the Import Policy (1983) and Electronic Policy (1985) laid the foundations for the growth of IT industry in the country. Indian Railways adopted computerized ticket reservation system. Amid concerns regarding negative impact of IT on employment, scholars like Prabir Purkayastha had examined the impact of the new computer policy on the structure of employment.
In the fourth phase, during 1991-1998, the Department of Electronics established Software Technology Parks (STPs) in 1991 with satellite communication links which enabled Indian software companies to develop software applications on their international clients’ computers from India.
In the fifth phase, during 1998-2005, the National Task Force on Information Technology and Software Development was constituted. The Department of Electronics created the Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) in different cities, owned by the government. The Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000, the first e-commerce law was enacted in the aftermath of the adoption of resolution on Model Law on Electronic Commerce by UN General Assembly January 30, 1997 for electronic transactions, e-commerce and e-governance. This was done after the adoption of the model law by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL). The UN resolution had recommended that all States to consider the model law in view of the need for uniformity of the law applicable to alternatives to paper-cased methods of communication and storage of information. The minister of information technology informed the parliament that “The USA UK and the European Union have followed it”. The Indian e-commerce law provided legal recognition for transactions carried out by means of electronic data interchange and other means of electronic communication, commonly referred to as "electronic commerce", which involve the use of alternatives to paper-based methods of communication and storage of information, to facilitate electronic filing of documents with the Government agencies and further to amend related laws. At the time of the enactment of this law the minister had informed the parliament that “80 per cent of them are those who are heading the IT industry” are the richest persons all over the world or in India. During the debate in the parliament on the law it was claimed in May 2000 that “Bill Gates company has 36 per cent of the people working in that company reported to have the Indian origin.”
Notably, use of manually filled ballot papers was discontinued. Since the general elections of 2004 only EVMs are used in India amid calls for its discontinuance.
India’s Information Technology law states that "computer" means any electronic magnetic, optical or other high-speed data processing device or system which performs logical, arithmetic, and memory functions by manipulations of electronic, magnetic or optical impulses, and includes all input, output, processing, storage, computer software, or communication facilities which are connected or related to the computer in a computer system or computer network". Under the law, information" includes data, text, images, sound, voice, codes, computer programmes, software and databases or micro film or computer generated micro fiche. According to the law, "data" means a representation of information, knowledge, facts, concepts or instructions which are being prepared or have been prepared in a formalised manner, and is intended to be processed, is being processed or has been processed in a computer system or computer network, and may be in any form (including computer printouts magnetic or optical storage media, punched cards, punched tapes) or stored internally in the memory of the computer.
In the sixth phase, during 2005-2026, ignoring the recommendations of a study by London School of Economics against "inappropriate" biometric national ID with "capability to electronically trace and profile all" published in June 2005, the Task Force for preparation of Policy Document on Identity and Access Management constituted in 2006 submitted a report that disclosed Project Unique ID (UID) "to create a central database of resident in the country". Its 34 members included representatives from the Technology Solution Providers like i. IBM, ii. Microsoft, iii. Oracle, iv. Computer Associates, v. Novell, vi. Honeywell, vii. HP, viii. Red Hat, ix. ILANTUS Technologies, x. MPhasis and xi. PwC besides other members from NIC, Department of Information Technology (DIT), National Institute for Smart Government, Ministry of Commerce and Industry's Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (E-BizProject), Standardisation Testing and Quality Certification Directorate, ECIL, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances, Osmania University, IIT Kharagpur, Indian Institute of Information Technology, Bangalore and Society for Promotion of e-Governance in India. The concept of unique identification (UID) was first discussed in 2006. The administrative approval for the project "Unique ID for BPL families" was given on March 3, 2006 by Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications & Information Technology during the tenure Dayanidhi Maran as the minister. The Planning Commission's Process Committee led by Dr Arvind Virmani was formed on July 3, 2006 to suggest processes for updation, modification, addition and deletion of data fields from core database under "Unique ID for BPL families’ project. The Committee hired Wipro Ltd as its consultant. Wipro prepared a 14-page long "Strategic Vision: Unique Identification of Residents" in July 2006 envisaging the close linkage that the UID Number with the electoral database. Another 15-page long Wipro document entitled "Does India need a Unique Identity Number?" cited example of UK's Identity Cards Act, 2006 to advance the argument for a biometric UID Number. After UK abandoned its ID card project, Wipro chose to maintain its deafening silence. The Comptroller Auditor General (CAG) of India was misled to belief that it was DIT, not Wipro Ltd which submitted the “Strategic Vision – Unique Identification of Residents" to Process Committee, which approved a UID Authority to be created by executive order. The Process Committee furnished a detailed proposal in this regard.
Notably, CAG was misled to ensure that it does not audit the conduct of Planning Commission's Process Committee and Wipro Ltd, their consultant who has been accused of 'undue favours' in the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) project by CAG. The report of Dr. S.I. Ahson headed 34-member Task Force for preparation of Policy Document on Identity and Access Management had revealed in April 2007 that the Project Unique ID (UID) is "to create a central database of resident in the country".
The establishment of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for issuance of 12-digit Unique Identity unique identification (UID)/Aadhaar numbers assigned to the residents of India in January 2009 and the enactment of Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits, and Services) Act, 2016, the second e-commerce law through a Money Bill has been detected to be constitutionally questionable by a 5-Judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court of India. In the meanwhile, over 138 crore Aadhaar Numbers have been issued as of October 2024. Initially, UID/Aadhaar Number was declared “voluntary” and subsequently it has been made mandatory in an illegitimate manner. The union government claims that over 2200 social welfare schemes of government using Aadhaar Number. It has also claimed that more than 270 good governance schemes and services are using Aadhaar Number and around 500 entities in the financial and telecom sectors have notified to use Aadhaar Number and numerous private and public service providers employing offline verification of Aadhaar Number for rendering services to individuals. The commercial czars who are benefiting from Aadhaar Number Online Database were brought to light in Comptroller Auditor General's audit report on UIDAI's performance. But government which misled Lok Sabha on July 20, 2022 about Action Taken Report is now using the observations of Nobel laureate Paul Romer to defend Aadhaar Number project unmindful of the fact that Section 57 of the Aadhaar Act which enabled data transfer to private entities has been declared unconstitutional and omitted from the Act! It also disregards the fact that the case against Aadhaar law is pending before a 7-judge Constitution Bench since November 13, 2019.
Notably, Information Technology (Reasonable security practices and procedures and sensitive personal data or information) Rules, 2011 framed under sections 87 (2) and 43A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 refers to biometric “technologies that measure and analyse human body characteristics, such as 'fingerprints', 'eye retinas and irises', 'voice patterns', "facial patterns', 'hand measurements' and 'DNA' for authentication purposes.” It is apparent that the term “Information Technology” is pregnant with wider meaning. As a consequence. the explicit and implicit provisions of the IT law require judicial imagination for harmonious construction.
In such a backdrop, software applications are being pushed by e-commerce and platform economy czars who benefit from monetization of personal sensitive information which could be misused for indiscriminate profiling and mass surveillance using demographic, biometric and metadata. It has increased the vulnerability of the communities, migrants and their defenders who get profiled. Such profiling facilitates emergence of a police state. In this context, ‘profiling’ means any form of automated processing of personal data consisting of the use of personal data to evaluate certain personal aspects relating to a natural person, in particular to analyse or predict aspects concerning that natural person’s performance at work, economic situation, health, personal preferences, interests, reliability, behaviour, location or movements. This kind of profiling has resulted in violence and discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, caste and class. There are anecdotal oral narratives which reveal how existing databases like census and electoral database in the possession of state has been leaked to facilitate the perpetrators of mass violence. Such violence is also aimed at the disruption of economic activities of the minorities, migrants and those who are portrayed to be of a different race, religion, region, ethnicity and beliefs. The resentment against the relative economic prosperity of those who are supposedly non-natives or risk groups gets manifested when their economic activities are subjected to both panoptic and synoptic gaze. It is increasingly evident that surveillance is a decisive economic operator. Electronic-commerce platforms are drawing heavily on it to reduce the cost of distance in trade. These platforms have reduced the cost of distance in trade by 60%. The data collected through profiling is harming individuals, local businesses, employee and non-employee societies in particular by keeping a permanent record about them. This is unfolding in a situation where national legislature has ailed to keep pace with the unprecedented speed of non-neutral technological innovations promoted by the beneficial owners of database and surveillance technology firms.
A report from Horses for Sources had predicted that India is likely to lose more jobs because of automation. Major IT firms such as IBM, Cisco, and Microsoft have laid off over 100,000 employees across the globe in the second half of 2024. Job cuts in major IT companies increased by 15 per cent in 2023 compared to the previous year. The Periodic Labour Force Survey for January–March 2024 revealed that the unemployment rate in the 15–29 age group at 17%. Out of 22,000 job types surveyed, 11% of the jobs have become vulnerable due to Artificial intelligence (AI). Due to the increased usage of automation through AI more jobs losses are on the horizon.
The concerns expressed in the report of the Dandekar Committee on (1972) on automation seems to be getting vindicated in the face of AI replacing human workers with robot workers in the workplace. The report had taken note of a comprehensive survey to assess the impact of office automation on clerical employment made by the U.K. Ministry of labour (1965) which had estimated that on an average, the installation of a computer led to a reduction of 14.5 percent of the jobs existing in the data processing sections of the office before equipment was installed and that an additional 12.5 percent would have been created to cope up with increasing work had the computer not been installed. The number of jobs taken over by the computers, thus, amounted to 27 percent against which had to be set 4.5 percent new jabs created to operate the new equipment, It emerged that there was a net reduction of 22 percent in the number of job opportunities in the data processing sections of the offices surveyed. During the period of the survey the average undertaking installing computers experienced an increase of 8 percent in the number of office jobs, but the number of jobs would have risen by approximately 13 percent had the computer riot been installed. This difference in the rate of growth in office jobs in these undertakings represented about 0.75 percent of the office workers in U.K., and working from these estimates the report forecasts that the introduction of computers in the years 1964—70 is likely to effect a reduction of not more than 20 per cent in the demand for office workers. The surveys undertaken by Bureau of Labour Statistics, U.S.A.had shown a similar trend. The hearing conducted by the U.S Sub-Committee on Census and Government Statistics of the House of Representatives on Post Office and Civil Service in 1959 and 1960 to determine the extent and implications of office automation for federal clerical workers had pointed out that office automation led to perceptible decline in employment.
Besides these assessment from foreign countries, the committee drew on its own study and the findings of report from Maharashtra to conclude that “we do recognize certain legitimate uses of computers in education, science, research, statistics and defence as also in commercial and industrial establishments” but emphasised the need for appropriate regulation and safeguards to prevent its adverse effects. It recommended steps meet hardware and software needs from indigenous sources “to offset, at least partly, any possible adverse effects of computerisation on employment. It will also make possible development of research and training of skilled manpower in the field of computer technology.” These recommendations appear appropriate to deal with the political and economic power of increasingly ungovernable technology owners.
Law and justice for workers in IT Sector
By now it is apparent that “IT” is a misnomer. It is actually a term for “all seeing” automatic identification and surveillance technologies akin to a panopticon. Derived from two Greek words which means "all-seeing", the original idea of panopticon was that of a prison conceived and designed to ensure perfect comprehensive surveillance of the prisoners. Panopticon refers to “the few seeing the many”. In this architecture, all those humans who have been made sub-humans through their categorisation as prisoners are under the inspection of few inspectors. Its re-incarnation as digital panopticon has enabled it to envelop the entire human population and subject them to eternal inspection. This idea has magnified manifold. Its merger with the idea of synopticon is paving the way for 360˚ surveillance of every imaginable human activity. Synopticon refers to "the many seeing the few". Unlike panopticon, in syopticona small “risk group” is put under the constant gaze of a large section of population who happen to believe them to be part of a “risk-group”. For long synopticon has been deemed to be the reverse of the panopticon. It does not mean that both cannot work in tandem. After profiling through mass-surveillance using panopticon, the “risk-group” is singled-out and subjected to synopticon. The latter is also used to legitimize the former in the public sphere through apparent ground truthing of sort in order to set the agenda of “what people think about” and “how they think about it”.
Automatic identification technologies and applications are facilitating stigmatization, discrimination, and physical assaults on “risk groups” including workers and their supporters. A growing convergence between the beneficial owners of these technologies and the State is creating a Technopolis where squeezing of natural rights through greater panoptic and synoptic gaze and manipulation of public behaviour is deemed natural and normal. In the present era, the panoptic gaze focuses on the entire human population but its specific focus on workers, minorities, migrants and their defenders is disconcerting especially, because their fate awaits the rest of the society in subsequent phases.
The emergence of computer, smart mobile phones and social media platforms like Facebook as an “information panopticon and synopticon” has enabled monitoring of the work and behaviour of individuals through eternal scrutiny. The cumulative effect of both the gazes have disempowering implications wherein human agency.
The matter of labour laws is in the concurrent list of the Indian Constitution. The labour laws in India have not provided for employee monitoring and surveillance. The provisions of Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 and the Information Technology (Reasonable security practices and procedures and sensitive personal data or information) Rules, 2011 can be used to deal with it in a limited. Section 72A of the IT Act protects personal information from unlawful disclosure in breach of contract. Besides these provisions, Section 43A of the IT Act enables the Union Government to frame the IT Rules which seek to provide individuals certain rights with regards to their information and ensure protection of sensitive personal data or information. The IT Rules makes a distinction between personal information and sensitive personal data or information. According to Rule 2 (1)(i), personal information is defined as that information which directly or indirectly relates to a person, “in combination with other information available or likely to be available with a body corporate, is capable of identifying such person”. In comparison, Rule 3 fleshes out the composition of sensitive personal data or information which includes examples of sensitive information are passwords, medical history, biometric information, sexual orientation, bank account details, physiological or mental health condition, etc. Rule 5 of the IT Rules makes it mandatory for the data collector to seek consent in writing before collecting sensitive personal data or information and he is required to ensure that the collection is based on the principles of legality and necessity. The individual whose data is being collected should be made aware of the reason behind the collection of information and who would have access to such information under Rule 5. The data collector is required to practice purpose limitations and is prevented from retaining the information forever. Rule 8 and Section 43A of the IT Act places civil liabilities on companies for mishandling sensitive personal data or information.
The four labour codes- Code on Wages, 2019, Social Security Code, 2020, Industrial Relations Code 2020 and the Occupational Safety Code 2020-that were enacted in place of 29 laws have come into force in its entirety.
The Social Security Code which has 164 sections absorbed the nine previous laws on social security, which had 256 sections collectively. A careful study of the 164 sections of the Code revealed that almost half of the sections state that the government will make laws (on the matter which the section addresses) on a later occasion. It leave the democratic space for deliberative legislation.
Significantly, the Social Security Code, 2022 recognises “gig workers” as a separate class of workers to whom it seeks to provide various benefits. According to the Code, "gig worker" means a person who performs work or participates in a work arrangement and earns from such activities outside of traditional employer-employee relationship. It also refers to "platform worker" as a person engaged in or undertaking platform work. The Code refers to both of them on 25 occasions. It defines “platform work” as “a work arrangement outside of a traditional employer-employee relationship in which organisations or individuals use an online platform to access other organisations or individuals to solve specific problems or to provide specific services or any such other activities which may be notified by the Central Government, in exchange for payment.” Each State has to finalise regulations for its implementation.
India’s Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 defines "worker" as any person employed in any establishment to do any manual, unskilled, skilled, technical, operational, clerical or supervisory work for hire or reward, whether the terms of employment be express or implied, and includes working journalists and sales promotion employees, but does not include any such person….who is employed mainly in a managerial or administrative capacity; or who is employed in a supervisory capacity drawing wage exceeding Rs 18,000/month. It defines "employee’ as a person employed on wages by an establishment to do any skilled, semi-skilled, unskilled, manual, operational, supervisory, managerial, administrative, technical, clerical or any other work, whether the terms of employment be express or implied.” It emerges that workers in the IT sector are not covered under the definition of workers in the Code but are covered under the definition of “employee”.
For long the Indian IT businesses have enjoyed the exemption given to them the Industrial Employment Standing Orders Act, of 1946. The Information Technology and related establishments have been exempted from the basic legal framework of Indian labour laws and its impact. A decision of the Karnataka High Court’s division bench in the Commissioner of Income Tax vs. Texas Instruments India Pvt Ltd delivered in April 2021 has held that “The software engineer per se would be a workman; a software engineer rendering supervisory work would not be a workman” which is good for the workers engaged in the IT industry but these workers have to satisfy the definition of ‘workmen’ according to Section 2(s) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.
Conclusion
Under false consciousness, a majority of internet users who seem to work for free for the social media firms do not appear to be smart enough to realize that their online activities are being monetized by the beneficial owners of information, automatic identification and surveillance technology. The law making has not been able to keep pace with the technological development in order to ensure their regulation and to make their beneficial owners subservient to country’s supreme interest.
In sharp contrast to the reciprocal concessions of early industrial capitalists, beneficial owners of information, automatic identification and surveillance technologies lay the foundation of what Zuboff refers to as “radical indifference”, which breeds exclusion because of their extreme structural independence from people. A Facebook Memo which engaged with the issue of good , bad and ugly aspects of its work. It asserted “The best products don’t win. The ones everyone uses win… make no mistake, growth tactics are how we got here.” The objective of the information and surveillance technology owner capitalist is to pursue products which traps “everyone,” not “the best products.”
The information and surveillance capitalists’ command and control of the division of learning in society is novel. Zuboff has pointed out that the combination of their knowledge and their freedom works to accelerate the asymmetry of power. They anticipate the behavior of populations, groups, workers, and individuals using retrospective data. Every computer-mediated work is accompanied by surveillance of the worker in order to gather behavioural data, the fourth fictitious commodity. The other three in Karl Polanyi’s list are: land, labour and money. The “users” of digital products are being transformed into sources of the behavioural data, new raw material for a digital-age production process aimed at creating new customers.
The scholars of workplace surveillance have traced the roots of worker's surveillance in slavery and the modern state. The monitoring of workers is aimed at extracting the most profit from them, and extinguishing potential rebellion and collective action. The history of technology is a testimony of the fact that the state has not been neutral or passive in deployment of technology which tracks, herds and neutralizes workers and their supporters before they can pose any threat.
The law takes a step further than the Social Security Code of 2022, which recognises gig workers and platform workers as a separate class of workers to whom it seeks to provide various benefits. This law paves the way for ensuring labour rights, social security, and welfare programmes for platform workers.
The symmetry of power can shift towards citizens, workers and employees only if the technology capitalists’ ability to freely know every aspect of the communities, workers and their families is made subservient to the consent of the people in general and the working class in particular. The workers legal right to know how they are being tracked and their right to have a say over the surveillance technologies being employed on them is yet to be recognized. There is a compelling need to assert this absolute fundamental right for safeguarding human dignity because all other rights are linked to it.
This paper entitled “Employment and Dignity Under Beneficial Owners of Information, Automatic Identification and Surveillance Technology” was presented at Nalanda University during 25th Annual Conference of Indian Association of Social Science Institutions (IASSI) on October 26. The Annual Conference of concludes on 28 October 2026. The abstract of the paper has been published in the book of abstracts published at the university by IASSI.
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(Dr. Gopal Krishna, the author is a practicing advocate and a researcher of philosophy, mass communication and law. His current work is focused on the philosophy of digital totalitarianism and the monetisation of nature. He has appeared before the Supreme Court's Committees, Parliamentary Committees of Europe, Germany and India and UN agencies on the subject of national and international legislations on UID/Aadhaar/NPR, DNA profiling through criminal identification procedures, nuclear damage, consumers, land acquisition, biological diversity, finance, hazardous waste trade, water cycle and corporate crimes since 2001. He is an ex-Fellow, International Research Group on Authoritarianism and Counter Strategies (IRGAC)-University of Potsdam, Germany.)
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