Backing out

The Bill that the government finally introduced to safeguard the interests of workers in the unorganised sector is a disappointment.

At a construction

The UPA government is firmly committed to ensure the welfare and well-being of all workers, particularly those in the unorganised sector who constitute 93 per cent of our workforce. Social security, health insurance and other schemes for such workers like weavers, handloom workers, fishermen and fisherwomen, toddy tappers, leather workers, plantation labour, beedi workers etc, will be expanded.

Enhance the welfare and well-being of farmers, farm labour and workers, particularly those in the unorganised sector and assure a secure future for their families in every respect. The UPA administration will ensure the fullest implementation of minimum wage laws for farm labour. Comprehensive protective legislation will be enacted for all agricultural workers.

From the Common Minimum Programme of the United Progressive Alliance.

ON September 10, when Union Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes introduced in the Rajya Sabha a watered-down version of what had been originally envisaged as the Unorganised Sector Workers Social Security Bill, 2007, it was clear that the government had not quite adhered to its commitment made in the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) three years ago. Predictably, the move raised the hackles of the Left parties and the trade unions affiliated to them. Indeed, other central trade unions also expressed concern at the way in which the truncated Bill was introduced hours before Parliament was adjourned sine die. Most central trade unions have decided, separately, to conduct protests on October 31.

The introduction of a single Bill with provisions only for social security was unexpected because the government-appointed National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS) had recently proposed two separate Bills, one for agricultural workers and the other for unorganised non-agricultural workers, covering working conditions, welfare, livelihood promotion and social security. The two proposed Bills drafted by the NCEUS, which were submitted to the Prime Minister on July 7, recommended a minimum standard of conditions of work and a minimum level of social security. In August, the NCEUS also submitted a detailed report on the living and working conditions of unorganised workers.

The new Bill spells out no financial obligation on the part of either the State governments or the Centre; it appears to be merely a document of good intent and bureaucratic jargon defining administrative guidelines for the implementation of the Bill. It provides for welfare schemes to be recommended by a National Social Security Advisory Board, on whose advice the Central government will formulate welfare schemes for unorganised sector workers. In the absence of any financial commitment or a time frame, which the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) says are basic ingredients of an enactment, it is feared that the proposed legislation will remain just some pages in the statute book.

The government declared its intent in May, a little over two months before the NCEUS report was submitted. In a statement issued by the Press Information Bureau on May 24, the broad outlines of the proposed Bill were spelt out, drawing sharp reactions from trade unions. On August 8, there was a nationwide strike by unorganised sector workers demanding the introduction and passage of two separate Bills.

On August 11, central trade union representatives met the Union Labour Minister to express their concern and put forth their suggestions.

On September 8, two days before the Bill was introduced in Parliament, a delegation of Communist Party of India (Marxist) Members of Parliament, including Sitaram Yechury, Brinda Karat, Tapan Sen and Basudeb Acharya, met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. In a note to the Prime Minister, they urged the UPA not to delay any longer the passage of the proposed twin legislation governing the unorganised sector and also to not introduce the truncated draft Bill that had been cleared by the Union Cabinet.

The CPI(M) MPs reminded the Prime Minister of the Union Labour Ministers unrealised commitment, made in the last Budget session, to introduce the two Bills in that session. Their note pointed out that all the central trade unions had urged the Labour Minister to finalise the Bills on the basis of the drafts provided by the NCEUS and in consultation with the central unions, and to introduce them during the current session.

The report of the government-constituted NCEUS on the conditions of the unorganised sector workers has revealed the abject distress and impoverishment of the overwhelming majority of the countrys productive workforce which requires urgent and comprehensive redressal, the note said.

Two days later, it was clear that the government had not paid heed to any of their requests. The CITU secretariat issued a statement criticising Fernandes for ignoring its suggestions regarding floor-level security for all unorganised sector workers. The CITU said that the Bill was nothing but a replica of what the Union Cabinet had approved and publicised through the Press Information Bureau on May 24, which was rejected by all central trade unions as a mere expression of pious intent without any substantive, time-bound and enforceable social security measures and appropriate funding arrangement.

The CITU has also criticised the way in which the government has ignored the recommendations of the NCEUS. P.K. Ganguly, a CITU central working committee member, told Frontline that the NCEUS drafts of the proposed laws were not perfect but at least they had taken into account the trade unions suggestions regarding the need for two Bills. There has to be two separate Bills. The present Bill should be sent to a parliamentary standing committee, he said.

The NCEUS recommended separate Bills to safeguard the interests of agricultural and non-agricultural workers in the informal sector because the two categories of workers have specific needs that require separate measures.

Among the measures proposed in the two Bills drafted by the NCEUS were eight-hour working days with half-hour breaks; one paid day of rest in a week; the right to organise; a national minimum wage for all employments (something not included in the Minimum Wages Act); penal interest for deferred payment of wages; protection from sexual harassment; and provision of child care and basic amenities at the workplace. The NCEUS proposals were more in line with the commitments made in the CMP.

In August, the NCEUS presented to the Prime Minister an analysis of the living and working conditions of unorganised workers, who comprise 93 per cent of the countrys total workforce of 457 million, in its report on Conditions of work and promotion of livelihoods in the unorganised sector.

The NCEUS report says that the unorganised, informal economy accounts for an overwhelming proportion of the poor and vulnerable people. Their livelihood options are limited and they work in deplorable conditions. The analysis, a scathing indictment of Shining India, has found that 77 per cent of the population categorised as vulnerable comprises Dalits, Muslims and Other Backward Classes. The report does not entirely refute the perceived buoyancy in the economy but observes that most people do not get to spend even Rs.20 a day.

At the end of 2004-05, nearly 836 million people, or 77 per cent of the population, lived on less than Rs.20 a day. About 79 per cent of the workers in the informal or unorganised sector belonged to this group, which lacked legal protection for their jobs or social security. This is the category, the report says, that is excluded from all the glory of a shining India.

Only 0.4 per cent of unorganised sector workers have access to social security benefits such as Provident Fund, and the situation has not changed since 1999-2000. The total employment in the economy increased from 397 million to 457 million between the 55th (1999-2000) and 61st (2004-05) round of the National Sample Survey.

What is important here is that the growth in the organised or formal employment was almost negative: the increase in the total employment of close to 17 per cent was entirely in unorganised sector, which is characterised by lack of social security. The NCEUS has carved out a category of home-based workers primarily because women comprise the bulk of such workers and require separate policy attention. In 1999-2000, the NSS Employment and Unemployment Survey revealed that there were around 8.2 million home-workers, of whom 4.8 million were women.

The NCEUS has also classified the population into six groups on the basis of consumption expenditure. The extremely poor are those with a per capita expenditure of Rs.8.9 a day while the poor are those who can spend up to Rs.11.6 a day. The marginally poor spend Rs.14.6 a day and the vulnerable spend Rs.20.3. In 2004-05, the extremely poor constituted 6.4 per cent of the population while the poor constituted 15.4 per cent. The marginally poor constituted 19 per cent of the population, and along with the vulnerable, this group constituted 77 per cent of the population.

Who are the poor and the vulnerable? They comprise nearly 79 per cent of the informal workers, 88 per cent of the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes, 80 per cent of the OBCs and 84 per cent of Muslims. There was a slight reduction in extreme poverty between 1993 and 2005, but the percentage of the vulnerable population increased from 32 to 36 per cent. On the other hand, the high-income group increased from 18 to 23 per cent of the population.

The analysis found that the bulk of the consumption expenditure of the vulnerable was on food, including cereals and pulses, while the middle- and high-income groups spent a far smaller fraction of their incomes on cereals and essential non-food items and tended to spend more on non-essential non-food and food items as well as on durable goods. This was Shining India indulging in conspicuous consumption.

The Indian growth story, noted the NCEUS report, had been characterised by a rapid growth of the middle class and the rich. This Shining India expanded in the past and was still expanding fast, a growth that coexisted with virtual stagnant consumption expenditure for 77 per cent of the population, it said.

The report recommended a re-evaluation of the official poverty line, especially in the context of the multi-dimensional nature of poverty.

The National Commission on Rural Labour also had recommended, in 1991, a multi-dimensional strategy to lift rural labourers out of poverty. It also recommended a minimum wage for workers.