Death of an Indian worker sheds light on the plight of farm workers in Italy

ROME – The death of an Indian farm worker in a gruesome accident in which a machine severed his right arm has put a spotlight on the living conditions of migrant agricultural workers in Italy, who unions say are often employed illegally and exploited.

Satnam Singh, 31, died in a Rome hospital on Wednesday, two days after he was injured while working in a melon greenhouse in Agro Pontino, a rural area south of the capital.

According to media reports, Singh was left outside his house with injuries to his arms and legs and his severed limb was placed in a fruit box.

“We heard screaming outside, the man’s wife threw herself on me and screamed: ‘Call an ambulance, call an ambulance,'” a neighbor told public broadcaster RAI.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni expressed regret over the tragedy during a cabinet meeting on Thursday.

“These are inhumane acts that do not deserve the Italian people and I hope that this barbarism will be severely punished,” she said in a comment sent by her office.

The farm’s owner, Renzo Lovato, expressed regret over the accident but said Singh had been warned not to approach the machine that injured him.

“The worker did it his way. Unfortunately, it was negligence,” Lovato told RAI.

Lovato’s son, who allegedly left Singh outside his home, is under investigation for possible manslaughter and failure to render aid charges, the lead prosecutor in the case, Giuseppe De Falco, said in an email.

“He spontaneously went to the criminal investigation department an hour after the events, as any decent person would do,” Lovato’s family lawyer told Reuters, adding that his client was waiting for the formal charges to be filed so he could defend himself.

In response to the allegation that Singh was left behind without calling an ambulance, lawyer Valerio Righi said: “You will see during the proceedings that perhaps help was called sooner than people think.”

Some politicians and unions said the tragedy had highlighted the larger problem of the “caporalato,” an illegal gangmaster system for hiring migrant workers that is widespread in Agro Pontino and other parts of Italy.

Righi declined to comment on reports that Singh and his wife were employed illegally. Other details about his working conditions were also unclear.

Maria Grazia Gabrielli of Italy’s largest union, Cgil, condemned the incident as an “incident of unprecedented brutality” and pointed to what she said were the slave-like conditions under which many agricultural workers suffered.

“Exploitation in the fields very often leads to starvation wages, unsafe and inhumane working conditions and rhythms, as well as psychological and physical violence,” she said in a statement.

According to 2021 data from the national statistics office Istat, about 11% of Italian workers were employed illegally, and in agriculture this figure is even more than 23%.

The Lazio region, to which Agro Pontino belongs, offered to cover Singh’s funeral expenses.

Responding to the outcry over Singh’s death, Agriculture Minister Francesco Lollobrigida said the government was “at the forefront on all fronts to combat any form of exploitation in the workplace.”