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New Delhi: Every year, thousands of workers in India’s automotive supply chain suffer crush injuries – severe compression on parts of the body costing fingers, hands, and at times, entire livelihoods – after operating faulty machinery without adequate training or protection. Every year, several of these workers discover that their Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) cards were not issued before the accident, cutting them off from the medical care and financial compensation they are entitled to. And every year, despite repeatedly flagging these failures to factory supervisors, automotive manufacturers and government bodies, the system continues largely unchanged. 

Safe in India (SII) Foundation’s eighth annual report, CRUSHED 2026, documents this persisting issue: recording worker testimonies, brand and state-level analysis and on-ground implementation of governmental occupational safety and health (OSH) provisions. In 2025 alone, SII assisted 2,514 injured workers, the highest single-year figure in the nine years it has been active. Since 2016, SII’s Worker Assistance Centres (WACs) across Haryana and Maharashtra have advocated for over 11,000 injured workers, of whom more than 9,000 were from the automotive sector. A majority of the affected workers are migrants, young, non-unionised and in contractual employment without livelihood security, the report says. 

“When I arrived on my first day, my boss told me to work and so I worked. They did not train me at all,” Jayashree Phad, an injured worker, told SII.

Her account reflects the broader sentiments of thousands of workers. One of the most commonly reported injuries occurs when a machine strikes twice while a worker is placing a metal part into a power press. The “double stroke” stems from easily-mendable, defective components like loose pins, broken paddles or damaged springs. It accounts for 76% of all crush injuries recorded by SII since 2016, with the average loss being two fingers per accident, a figure that has not shifted in seven years. 

Photo: CRUSHED 2026, Safe In India Foundation.

According to the report, nearly 95% of power press injuries took place on machines with no functioning safety sensor. This figure has steadily oscillated between 91% and 99% since 2019, with no discernible improvement. In 76% of cases, machine inspection occurred only after an accident or ahead of a scheduled audit, rather than as the routine exercise the law mandates. Moreover, 84% of workers who flagged machine faults before accidents were ignored. 

Photo: CRUSHED 2026, Safe In India Foundation.

Sintu Kumar, a worker from Bihar, told SII, “I was working in the night shift. I had already reported the faulty machine button, but it was ignored. Then, at 12:10 AM, the button accidentally triggered, and my left index finger was cut off.”

Ramsingh, a factory worker, told SII that workers are frequently put on machines they are not qualified to operate. After an accident, the management’s often replies, “Accident ho gaya to ho gaya, koi dusra mil jayega” (If an accident occurred so be it, we’ll easily find someone else). 

This disregard also extends to basic safety provisions. Workers told SII that factories deliberately avoid putting sensors on machines, since stopping due to proximity alerts reduces productivity. 

V.N. Saroja,........

© The Wire