ISSUES
No guarantee for work
MEENA MENON
|
The idea behind the Rozgar Adhikar Yatra was to raise awareness about the Employment Guarantee Act and focus on unemployment. But how serious is the Government about guaranteeing employment?
|
HAND OF SOLIDARITY: Writer and activist Arundhati Roy wishing the yatra luck. PHOTO: RAMESH SHARMA
FAHIM (5) holds a grimy plastic bag under his arm as he watches a play on corruption and looting of public money by the Rajasthan-based Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sanghatan (MKSS). He has never been to school and he is the only child who does not laugh while watching the play.
There are many like him in Bhopal's New Market area who collect and sell waste paper for a living. "I start work at 9.00 a.m. I walk here from my home at Roshanpura," says Fahim, an orphan who lives with his four siblings. Often he goes hungry after working till 10 p.m.
Rural unemployment
His friends, too, wander around selling odds and ends or collecting rubbish for which they get three or five rupees at the most. Fahim and the others were not the only children we met in Madhya Pradesh in the course of the Rozgar Adhikar Yatra, which was flagged off in New Delhi on May 13. Almost everywhere where the MKSS staged street plays, there were children. Most worked in hotels, cycle shops, collecting rags; some had never been to school. The numerous child workers are a pointer to the serious situation of rural unemployment, which has increased by over five per cent between 1993 and2000. Workers' organisations have been agitating for a National Employment Guarantee Act for many years. The National Common Programme of the UPA Government also begins with a similar pledge. However, when the Government finally tabled the draft National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in Parliament last December, many provisions of the draft prepared by the National Advisory Council (NAC) had been diluted.
The Yatra, a collective effort by the People's Action for Employment Guarantee comprising over 100 organisations, is travelling through 10 states in a bus smothered with slogans and posters proclaiming "Har Haath Ko Kaam Do, Kam Ka Pura Dam Do. (Give each hand some work, give the full price for the work)" Economist Jean Dreze, who is taking part in the yatra, said that it was politically strange that the Government wanted to bring in an Act about which there was no awareness.
The Rozgar Adhikar Yatra emerged from the need to consolidate a public campaign for a full-fledged universal and irreversible Employment Guarantee Act. Everywhere there were reports of no work. Even the ambitious Food for Work programme showed many flaws. The situation in large parts of India, even in peak season, was that there is no work. In Madhya Pradesh combined harvesters were reducing labour and adding to the problem, says Shamim Modi of the Shramik Adivasi Sanghatana.
Migration
The resulting migration is evident in most cities where people face insecurity and harassment. Indore is a classic example where people — many Maharashtra and even Rajasthan — who came to find work have settled down. In Harsud and other areas, the issue of displacement dominated the debate. Prof. Dreze said that unemployment is a form of displacement.
A dam on the Veda, a tributary of the Narmada, will submerge Udaipur village, Khargone District, Madhya Pradesh. People have been migrating from the village in search of work for 10 years. Bhondar Singh goes to Surat every year for several months or even to Vapi where he gets Rs. 3,000 a month. "Now the dam is being built and it will affect our chances of work, as there is nothing nearby. Who knows where we will resettle. Already people are going to Indore, about 165 km away, to work," he says. People are not aware of minimum wages here, as work is rare. The dam is being built by labourers brought from outside.
In the wasteland that is now Harsud, Gangabai ekes out a living collecting and selling scrap. She does not get work in the fields any more. In the resettlement colony at Chanera for Harsud residents displaced by the Indira Sagar dam, there is great anger and resentment. There was universal condemnation of the resettlement process and the main issue was the lack of guarantee of livelihood.
In many places, the situation of unemployment has been aggravated by complete loss of control over natural resources as in Patti block in Badwani district. Here work is available for 18 days a year, according to Kham Singh. People are migrating for longer and longer periods and some do not come back, according to Madhuri Krishnaswamy of Jagrut Adivasi Dalit Sanghatana.
In Shobhapur, for instance, where the yatra bus attracted as much attention as the messages of the Yatris, children complained that the teachers did not turn up regularly in the local school. Women were paid Rs. 15 as daily wages in the rare event of work being available.
Already 50 per cent of the village migrates every year and bonded labour is rampant. In small town Khirkiya near Harda, hawkers are being pushed out to make way for bigger shops and retailers. Even in industrially developed places like Pathakheda where Western Coalfields is located, there was a sense of despair. A group of young boys said there was no point getting educated, as there were no jobs.
No work
At the large and colourful Sunday market at Sarni, near the State-owned 1400 MW power plant, Phulwanti and Mahuabai had walked four hours to do their weekly shopping. "There is no work in this area and we go to Itarsi and far off places," says Phulwanti. Prakash Chandra Sahu took to business after he lost his job. He said the power plant was also trying to reduce workers by offering VRS. Livelihoods are being affected everywhere and while people may not have heard of the proposed Employment Guarantee Act, they definitely want work.
When the yatra ends, it would have travelled through States that are facing an acute problem of unemployment and migration. It seems crazy to racket about the hottest places in summer, spreading awareness about the need for employment guarantee. The conviction of the small group of students, economists, union leaders and activists, could only have been strengthened after the yatr. The question is how serious is the government about guaranteeing employment?
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Magazine
