With end of the 10-minute era, it is time for protecting interests of gig workers

In the latest phase of e-commerce, quick (instant) commerce has been dominating the market for quite some time. Although quick commerce began with the argument of providing daily-use goods quickly and conveniently, this model has consistently raised several ethical concerns.

On January 13, 2026, a major quick-commerce app, Blinkit, removed the claim of 10-minute delivery from its app. Similarly, other players have also indicated that they intend to stop mentioning 10-minute delivery on their respective apps. With this, it is being widely believed that the era of 10-minute delivery has come to an end.

How did the 10-minute era begin?

Quick commerce is a new form of e-commerce, comparable to fixed-time, app-based delivery of grocery items. The idea of delivering goods within 10–20 minutes through dark stores (warehouses not open to customers) did not originally emerge in India. The modern quick-commerce model first appeared in Europe and West Asia.

Examples include Getir (Turkey), which started in 2015; Gorillas (Germany), launched in 2020; Flink (Germany); and Gopuff (USA), among others. These companies popularised dark stores with promises of extremely fast delivery, largely backed by venture capital funding. It is believed that Indian startups and platforms adopted these models around 2020–21, especially during the COVID period.

One interesting aspect was that this model was generally liked by consumers, and it quickly attracted the market. After initial losses, players began to make money under this format. Increasingly, more and more players in e-commerce started adopting the quick-commerce model.

While shortcomings of this model were observed in other countries where it had been introduced earlier, in the Indian context it has faced sharp criticism—because the pressure of 10-minute delivery places enormous stress on delivery personnel, sometimes even leading to accidents.

The gig workers’ issue

Earlier, there were mainly two kinds of workers: first, those employed on a regular salaried basis with job security (in both the private and public sectors); and second, temporary workers who worked on a daily basis, often referred to as “daily wagers.”

There was an expectation that organised-sector employment would provide regular jobs. Later, with the era of LPG (liberalisation, privatisation, and globalisation), the system of contract workers emerged, where employees were hired on fixed pay without job security, through contractors, who often took hefty commissions and exploited workers. With the advent of app-based systems in e-commerce, we now see the emergence of a new class of workers known as “gig workers.” As is evident, many unemployed or underemployed youth — and even some students seeking additional income — are easily drawn to this work. This is followed by a cycle of squeesing workers through low pay. This happened in 2023, when e-commerce companies reduced payments to delivery agents, triggering widespread anger and strikes. Recently, once again, gig workers went on a brief strike against their working conditions, and one of their key demands was ending 10-minute delivery to reduce the pressure on them.

Government’s efforts

The current government has paid attention to the difficulties faced by gig workers. For the first time, the Government of India has formally recognised gig workers and platform workers in labor laws. The Code on Social Security, 2020 provides clear definitions of gig workers, platform workers, aggregators, and related categories. Earlier, gig workers were neither considered employees nor fully classified as self-employed. The government’s stance is that gig workers should be provided minimum social security, even if they are not regular employees. This includes health insurance, accident insurance, life insurance, maternity benefits, and, in the future, pension coverage.Gig workers have been given the facility to register on the e-Shram portal. After registration, they receive a unique ID, enabling them to access several social security schemes of the central and State Governments.

The Government is also working on a plan to create a National Social Security Fund, to which the central government, state governments, and digital platforms/aggregators may contribute. Recently, when the current Union Labour Minister suggested that platforms should end 10-minute delivery, taking into account the difficulties faced by delivery agents, Blinkit removed the 10-minute delivery offer from its app, and other companies have also decided to make similar changes.

Insensitivity of the market

While quick-commerce players accepted the government’s justified request to modify the 10-minute delivery model, on 13 January the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) sought an unusual clarification from Eternal Limited (the parent company of Blinkit, earlier known as Zomato) regarding reports of the removal of the “10-minute delivery” promise. This raised an important question about the market’s interventionist role when business practices are made more humane. Does the BSE not understand that this model was dangerous for delivery agents, and that the company’s decision — taken in response to public concern — was a humane and correct step?Although the company promptly responded to the query from exchange, such questions reveal the character of the market, where investor interests are often prioritised over workers’ interests. Interestingly, the very next day, on 14 January, the share price of Eternal Limited actually rose by 1.44 per cent.

Gig workers deserve better treatment

This new class of labour, known as gig workers, is a product of the emerging gig economy, which is based on new technologies. This class has emerged through online platforms, cloud work, freelancing, e-commerce, supply chains, and similar systems. In other words, new technologies and new business models themselves have created this new working class.

These workers, who perform tasks based on work or orders assigned through apps, clearly operate under the instructions of e-commerce platforms. Yet, under earlier official definitions, they were not considered workers and were instead labelled as “freelancers.” While the government has taken several steps to provide relief and facilities to gig workers, and the new labour laws have also offered them some protection, it must be ensured in the future that platform-owning companies take concrete steps to safeguard their interests.