No Savings, Scanty Jobs: Why Second Wave Has Been Harder For Migrant Workers indiaspend.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from indiaspend.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Sudhir Paswan, 29, is back to square one in his village in Bihar s Muzaffarpur district, counting his losses. It has been more than a week since he returned, after failing to secure a job in Delhi. A labourer who loaded and unloaded goods in Delhi s Okhla Industrial Area, he would earn between Rs 200 and Rs 700 a day. Since the lockdown, there was no work and access to food and essentials became difficult. I had to leave the city, he said. Over 800,000 migrants left India s capital, for instance, for their hometowns in 2021. Paswan is just one of them. Jobs have been hit harder since the lockdowns of 2021, put in place to control the second wave of Covid-19. May has shown double-digit unemployment figures, said Mahesh Vyas, chief executive officer of Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), a think-tank. More than 97% of India s population became poorer compared to where they were in terms of income, he said. Its effect on the informal sector, which had barely recovered fr
Govt-run helplines across country not worker friendly, says volunteers network
Calls made by SWAN to 80 officers from across 20 zones revealed they had an inadequate response mechanism to address the grievances of workers
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Around 33 per cent of workers had not received wages, while 15 per cent had received partial payments, the survey said. (Photo | EPS)
Express News Service
NEW DELHI: The government-run helplines have inadequate information and resources to help migrant workers, according to volunteers network Stranded Workers Action Network (SWAN).
Calls made by SWAN to 80 officers from across 20 zones revealed they had an inadequate response mechanism for enquiries related to migrant workers non-payment of due wages, provision of rations or cooked food, financial assistance to meet basic needs, protection from eviction by home owners, and support for travel back to their home states. The helplines were not worker friendly and were deficie
‘Helpline for migrant workers acts like a post office’
Updated:
Updated:
May 25, 2021 00:12 IST
The Stranded Workers Action Network says officials in most cases have stated they had no authority to intervene
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The Stranded Workers Action Network says officials in most cases have stated they had no authority to intervene
The Labour and Employment Ministry’s helpline for migrant workers was more of a post office than a helpline, forwarding complaints of unpaid wages, lack of food and other concerns affecting workers during the lockdown, the Stranded Workers Action Network (SWAN) said in a statement on Monday.
SWAN, which is a group of volunteers that came together to help migrant workers when the first COVID-19 lockdown was imposed in 2020, said the Ministry announced relaunch of its 20 control rooms set up to field distress calls from workers last year. The helplines included contact details of 100 Labour Commissioners across the country, of which 80 w