Noida wage protests: A decade of work, and wages barely doubled
Just crossing the street into Delhi can mean a pay raise. In Noida, workers are tired of being left behind.
When thousands of factory workers poured onto the streets of Noida on Monday, torching vehicles and clashing with police, they were not just angry; they were exhausted — exhausted from working 10–12 hours a day for wages that have barely moved in a decade. They demanded Rs 20,000 a month in wages, roughly Rs 769 a day. What they were getting was far less
The Uttar Pradesh government responded quickly. Under pressure from the scale of the protests, it announced a 21 per cent interim wage hike, raising the daily wage for unskilled workers in Noida and Ghaziabad. Officials called it a sensitive and timely response. Workers said it was not enough. And when you look at the data, it is hard to disagree.
WAGES HAVE CROWDED
Across Delhi, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh, factory workers have spent a decade watching their wages crawl while everything around them got more expensive.
In 2016, an unskilled factory worker in UP earned Rs 305 per day, a semi-skilled worker Rs 342, and a skilled worker Rs 277. In 2026, those numbers stand at Rs 500, Rs 550 and Rs 616 respectively. In ten years, only skilled workers in UP have crossed the double mark.
Haryana tells an even more uncomfortable story. In 2016, an unskilled worker earned Rs 310 per day, a semi-skilled worker Rs 326, and a skilled worker Rs 359. In 2026, these figures stand at Rs 585, Rs 645 and Rs 712. Not a single category managed to double in a decade.
WAGES DOUBLE IN DELHI
Delhi is the only state where wages have crossed the doubling mark across all three categories. In 2016, unskilled workers earned Rs 337 per day, semi-skilled workers at Rs 373, and skilled workers earned Rs 410. Today, these numbers are Rs 710, Rs 784, and Rs 862. Regardless, it’s been a slow growth.
The Noida protests have also exposed a sharp geographical inequality that the data makes it impossible to ignore. A skilled worker in Delhi earns Rs 862 per day. The same worker, doing the same job just across the border in Uttar Pradesh, earns Rs 616. That is a gap of Rs 246, every single day, or roughly Rs 6,000 a month.