Mainstream WeeklyJan 17, 2026
In the months I spent collecting data on working conditions of security guards in India, I repeatedly returned to a particular arithmetic that governed lives with ruthless precision. It was not the arithmetic of balance sheets or profit margins, though those also had significant bearing. Rather, it was the silent arithmetic of survival: how many hours one must work to feed a family, how many days one can go without speaking up before disrespect becomes unbearable, how much dignity can be traded for the promise of tomorrow.
Most guards in my sample, employed under state regulations, earned around ten thousand rupees per month after statutory deductions. These figures on paper, however, translated into lives lived precariously. It was not merely the low wages; rather, it was the systematic and almost choreographed erosion of these meager earnings that stood out. Wage thefts were not isolated incidents but an entire infrastructure. A system for clients and suppliers to use legal loopholes and extract labor at minimum possible cost. The progressive subcontracting of security services functioned as an organized wage suppression mechanism. An ATM guard told me his pay was slashed by fifteen hundred rupees when a new supplier took over the contract. Yet his silence on this sudden reduction was strange, as if he had made peace with the system that claimed full right to keep depreciating the value of his labor.
The collusion between clients and suppliers was rarely explicit, yet always present. Most clients maintained ignorance about whether guards received minimum wages, creating deliberate and strategic distance from accountability. At times, layers of subcontracting allowed clients to freely deny legal compliance responsibilities while benefiting from wage violations. Most guards worked below minimum wages at organizations that projected images of corporate responsibility and ethical governance. Wage increments, as mandated by law, existed more as theoretical entitlements than practical realities. Clients decided not only the amount but also the timing of increments, often agreeing to pittances only once annually. Some provided increments after suppliers began billing them according to revised government rates but felt no obligation to verify whether guards received these increases. Bonuses were entirely absent. The most insidious form of wage theft involved overtime. Guards routinely worked beyond the legally permissible limit of eight hours yet were compensated at ordinary rates rather than overtime wages. When asked, client managers seamlessly pointed fingers at suppliers for failing to deploy adequate numbers. Suppliers, in turn, argued they could only pay what clients provided and highlighted that contracts never included reserve personnel for leave coverage.
One supplier owner explained it to me in simple words