Feminist scholarship has shown time and again thatwomen's labour influences rural economic setup and livelihood. The present study focuses on the precarity of women handloom weavers at Sualkuchi, Assam. This paper identifies the workplace and household challenges faced bywomenweavers and highlights their struggle for livelihood with the help of a qualitative approach. The study finds that economic necessity, poverty, lack of education and large family size are major reasons that compel women to join the handloom industry for livelihood. Women weavers are exposed to occupational health risks, which led them to a vicious debt cycle. Besides, unhealthy work environment, low wages and unpaid household work make women weavers more vulnerable. In addition, socio-economic constraints prevent women weavers from holding decision-making roles and place them at the bottom of the hierarchy compared to their male counterparts. These challenges must be addressed to empower the women weavers.

As gig economy based firms increasingly rely upon algorithmic management to regulate their gig workers, we explore how driver-partners’ psychological contacts working for two major ridesharing platforms based on Mumbai evolve. The gig workers’ responses in how they adapt and thrive to the challenges posed by the information asymmetry brought about by the app’s algorithms are qualitatively captured using semi-structured interviews. From the thematic analysis that follows, we learn that the gig workers perceive psychological contract violation when repetitive attempts via problem-focused coping fail to resolve the psychological contract breach induced discrepancies. Though functional coping responses are persisted initially, we find that a collective influenced employee reaction follows soon. This collective attempt at resetting the power asymmetry leads the drivers to disengage with their organisations and resort to counterproductive work behaviour hacks. These temporary and significant quick fixes (identified as jugaad in the local culture) help the gig workers thrive amidst their disengagement states.