Critical Analysis of the Legal Uncertainty of Domestic Workers: Understanding the Framework, Vulnerabilities, and Pathways to Effective Protection in India

Domestic work is one of the largest sources of employment for women in urban India, yet the law treats domestic workers as neither fully workers nor fully family. This paper examines that legal uncertainty. It considers how the devaluation of unpaid domestic labour within the household extends to paid domestic work, and how caste, class and gender shape the conditions of the workforce. It then assesses the Indian legal framework, from the right to live with dignity under Article 21 and the judicial decisions on domestic work, including the direction of the Supreme Court in Ajay Malik v. State of Uttarakhand, to the Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008 and the four Labour Codes in force since 21 November 2025. It finds that there is still no central legislation specific to domestic workers, that the Codes treat them inconsistently and give them no protections of their own, and that comprehensive data on the workforce is lacking. Drawing on the ethics-of-care framework of Poddar and Koshy, which it reads as a reformulated labour law sensitive to the affective dimensions of the work, it argues that domestic work fits neither family law nor conventional labour law, and suggests embracing that ambivalence through targeted interventions aimed at specific vulnerabilities. It recommends a standalone central law, interim amendments to the Codes, local registration and welfare boards, a model employment contract, measures against caste-based discrimination, recognition of unions, publication of the All India Survey on Domestic Workers, and judicial recognition of private homes as workplaces.