How desperate can things get? The Maharashtra Police near Yavatmal, in a routine check of trucks a few days ago, found 300 cowering migrant workers crammed in two container carriers marked for carrying essential commodities. The shocked cops said the workers, hailing from Rajasthan, were desperate to return home from Hyderabad, after the ‘coronavirus’ shutdown. With all regular train and bus travel banned, they went for this life-threatening option. Other visuals showed thousands of migrant workers streaming out of Delhi at the Ghazipur border with UP, trying to reach their villages on foot. Some trekked as much as 150 kilometres on empty stomachs.
Casual workers in foreign surroundings, when they face disruption, rush to make their way back home to seek the comfort and support of their families. Somewhere we have missed the plight of these millions of drivers, brick layers and daily labourers who have been caught in the cleft of the sudden shutdown of their work places, and the overnight cancellation of all means of travel. Many thousands left nonetheless and are now stranded in various parts of the country.
Meeting criticism that it has not done enough, the government has just announced a safety net that aims at giving direct money transfer to a few vulnerable sections. Farmers will get their first tranche of Rs 2,000 out of their annual Rs 6,000-a-year PM-KISAN payout. Construction workers are to get access to a Rs 31,000 crore relief fund run by state governments. But there are literally crores of casual and migrant workers, both seasonal and permanent, who are not listed anywhere in government records and may not qualify for these benefits. As harvest time approaches, there are thousands of migrant agricultural labourers flooding rural India. Construction sites in cities too are manned by millions of workers on the move. Now, having lost their jobs, how will they make it through the ‘corona’ shutdown?
‘Informal’ economy What is this forgotten, ‘informal’ economy? It’s well known that more than 50 per cent of the national economic product is contributed by the unorganised or ‘informal’ sector. Data shows that 97.1 per cent of the agricultural or farm sector was ‘informal’, contributing about 17.2 per cent of the Gross Value Added (GVA). ‘Construction’, where 74 per cent of the industry is ‘informal’, makes up 7.8 per cent of the GVA. Trade, repair and accommodation, which gave 11.8 per cent of the GVA, was ‘informal’ to the extent of 86.6 per cent.
The above, sourced from a study by S Ramana Murthy, defines an informal worker as one “with no written contract, paid leave, health benefits or social security”. Using this yardstick, he shows that the people employed in the unorganised sector actually rose from 82.6 per cent of the total in 2011-12 to 85.5 per cent in 2017- 18. This is corroborated by the Union government’s Economic Survey of 2018-19, which says “almost 93 per cent” of the total workforce is ‘informal’.
The Economic Survey of India 2017 estimates that interstate migration was close to 9 million annually between 2011 and 2016, while Census 2011 pegs the total number of internal migrants in the country at a staggering 139 million, about 17 per cent of the country’s 800-million workforce. Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are the biggest source states; the major destination states are Delhi, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. A study paper of the College of Engineering, Trivandrum (authored by Shruti Ashok and Neena Thomas) on interstate migration said as much as 8 per cent of Kerala was made up of migrant labour. “This tremendous influx of migrants is due to three major factors, namely literacy of the state, attitude of people towards 3D (dirty, degrading & dangerous) kind of jobs and high daily wages.”
No record, no compliance The Ministry of Labour and Employment in its 2015 report on Employment in the Informal Sector concedes that 82 per cent of agricultural non-farm workers had no written job contract, 77 per cent got no paid leave and 69 per cent did not receive any social security benefits. There is a Minimum Wages Act, 1948 too, but with hardly any enforcement machinery. In fact, the latest set of Labour Reforms implemented by the Centre and by some states points to making compliance norms worse for those at the bottom of the ladder.
For instance, the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 has been watered down and made applicable to only units that employ 300 or more. Earlier, the application of the act was for units with 100 or more employees. Given the way the curfew was announced, with no lag time for common people to reach their homes thousands of miles away, shows how much mind space the underbelly commands in the corridors of power. For reliefs in the safety net to now reach the jobless and the migrant workers requires they be listed and traceable somewhere. That too is a tall order.
Significant, or not?
50% of the national economic product is contributed by the unorganised or ‘informal’ sector
97.1% of the agricultural sector was ‘informal’, contributing about 17.2% to the GVA
74% of the construction industry is ‘informal’ and contributes 7.8% to the GVA