India’s women gig workers are on their own

From being married off at 16, and being left to fend for herself in her early twenties with two young daughters, Ganga Mandal has come a long way. Today, the 35-year-old single mother lives in a two-bedroom house she bought recently in Jaipur’s Jaisinghpura neighborhood. Parked outside the house is a white Maruti Suzuki Alto. “This is my car,” she says, beaming with pride. 

Mandal is an Uber driver, a job she took up four years ago. It is as much a passion as a way to raise her teenage daughters, she says. The family of three, along with their …