Amputations routine among workers in Panipat textile recycling hub

Workers in Panipat's textile recycling industry are suffering amputations and other life-changing injuries at an alarming rate, an investigation by The Guardian, produced with the Pulitzer Center, has found.

Panipat processes an estimated one million tonnes of used clothing each year. Much of that volume originates as discards from the US, Canada and Europe, making the Haryana city a critical downstream tier for Western post-consumer textile waste streams.

The sector's scale is substantial. Roughly 20,000 factories operate in the city, employing about 300,000 people. Workers shred discarded garments back into fibre and spin that fibre into yarn — output that ultimately feeds products supplied to brands including H&M Home, IKEA, Primark, Tesco and Walmart.

What does the investigation establish?

The Guardian-Pulitzer Center investigation reports that serious injuries and amputations are common among workers handling imported textile waste in Panipat. The findings place workplace safety at the recycling tier squarely inside the supply chains of major Western retailers that source recycled-fibre products from the region.

The investigation did not allege that the named brands directly operate the factories concerned. The connection is commercial: recycled yarn and fibre produced in Panipat supplies product lines sold by H&M Home, IKEA, Primark, Tesco and Walmart, according to the report.

The takeaway: injury rates at this tier are now a documented, named-supplier-chain fact rather than an abstract labour-rights concern.

Where does Panipat sit in the sourcing chain?

Panipat occupies a specific position: it is a destination for post-consumer textile waste exported from high-income markets. The one million tonnes of used clothing processed annually represents discarded garments from the US, Canada and Europe re-entering production as shoddy fibre and recycled yarn.

This positions the city at the intersection of two compliance agendas for buyers: worker health and safety at supplier facilities, and the traceability of recycled-content claims in finished goods. Recycled-fibre sourcing programmes that treat Panipat yarn as inputs now carry an audited-injury-rate question alongside fibre-integrity checks.

The takeaway: any recycled-content claim sourced through Panipat now sits next to a documented worker-safety record.

What decision does this force on sourcing teams?

For brands named in the investigation — H&M Home, IKEA, Primark, Tesco and Walmart — the report creates pressure to verify conditions at the Indian recycling tier, not only at garment assembly factories. Conventional social audits rarely extend to fibre-recovery and yarn-spinning facilities processing post-consumer waste.

Sourcing and compliance leads face three immediate questions: whether existing supplier codes cover recycling subcontractors in Panipat; whether injury data from that tier is collected at all; and whether recycled-content sourcing targets depend on facilities with unverified safety records.

The takeaway: buyers of Panipat recycled yarn must decide whether to audit this tier or accept documented amputation risk within their fibre supply.