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Book Review
Rural labour scenario
EMPOWERING RURAL LABOUR IN INDIA — Market, State and Mobilisation: R. Radhakrishna, Alakh N. Sharma — Editors; Institute For Human Development, IAMR Building, Third Floor, IT Estate, Mahatma Gandhi Marg, New Delhi-110032. Rs. 195.
RURAL LABOUR is the most disadvantageous section of Indian population though agriculture is a major occupation
for the people here. Though their
levels of living have slightly improved
particularly in the 1980s, by and large,
rural labourers have not benefited
much from the general socio-economic
development witnessed after
Independence.
The book under review, written by
experts and social activists, provides
insights into recent development in
rural labour markets in India.
It has examined state intervention,
operation of market forces and activities
of trade unions, political parties
and non-governmental organisations,
particularly with regard to mobilisation
for development.
This becomes especially important
now in the post-reform period when
the rural sector has yet to receive the
attention that it deserves in the wake
of the new economic policy. Therefore
the collection of articles in this book is
highly relevant.
The book, which contains 21 articles,
opens with an introduction "Towards
empowering Rural Labour"
written by the Editors. It is divided into
three parts Labour markets and rural
poverty, Policy environment and
state interventions and Mobilization
for empowerment. It is indeed quite
appropriate that the opening part
should have dealt with rural poverty,
which has its origin in the nature of
rural labour market.
A section dealing with policy environment
and state intervention follows
this. In the wake of liberalisation
and economic reforms, a debate is currently
going on as to what should be
the kind and extent of state intervention.
It can take various forms and deal
with the different aspects of rural labour.
This is considered in the second
part. The third and concluding part
has dealt with non-governmental organisation
and voluntary action for organising
rural labour.
The first part, dealing with labour
markets and rural poverty contains six
papers which give an insight into various
cassette of the emerging reality of
the rural labour markets in India.
Two papers by Shiela Bhalla and Ahbijit
Sen notice that the favourable
long term trends in poverty reduction,
real wages and work force structure established
during 1980s were reversed
during the 1990s.
Such a reversal had unfavourable effects
like widening of the productivity
gap between form and non-form
workers and slackening of the work
force diversification.
Bagaram Tulpule has pointed out
how the rural sector was resisting
wrong development policies, particularly
the non-formal sector using labour
in a broad sense to include all
casual labourers and wage earners. It
is his contention that this section of
labour has remained untouched.
John Breman in his paper on "Rural
informal sector reconsidered'' has discussed
the limitations of earlier conceptualisation
of dualism and compared the size and dynamics ratio
between formal and informal sector labour.
He concludes by pointing out that
the distinction between formal and informal
income opportunities is based
essentially on that between wage earning
and self-employment, but this has
to be reconsidered now due to various
changes that have now come about.
The papers by Praveen Jha and
Krishnaiah have given consideration
to flexibility of rural labour markets
and labour institutions in backward
agriculture.
The flexibility is examined in relation
to its ability to clear involuntary
unemployment by a fall in wages, in
order to consider the real situation by
a survey finding in Bihar.
The paper by Krishnaiah entitled
"Labour institution in backward agriculture"
has discussed the functioning
of rural labour markets in the semiarid
backward areas, the recognition of
limitations of demand supply forces
and the adjustment mechanism itself.
The paper concludes by identifying
the need and scope for the state intervention
to improve the conditions
in the labour market.
The second part on policy environment
and state intervention has 10 papers,
the first of which is by Prof. C. H.
Hanumantha Rao who has considered
the major features of the labour scene
in the recent period.
He is of the view that the immediate
impact of stabilisation measures on
rural employment and welfare would
on balance be negative. Liberalisation
of the economy and the opening of
trade in agricultural commodities
would stimulate growth in agricultural
output.
The extent to which there will be increase
in growth and rural employment
would depend upon public
investment in infrastructure in the
best-developed and low waged areas.
The trickle-down approach is likely to
become even more unreal with greater
marketisation and privatisation unless
the growth rate of the economy is fixed
up to unbelievable higher level.
The recommendation of the National
Commission on Rural Labour ought
to have been implemented as soon as
they were published and now there is
urgent need for reconciling the effi-
ciency goals with considerations of social
justice.
The paper by Dev on Government
interventions and social security for
rural labour has given an overview of
government intervention in enhancing
the social security of rural labourers
and our views that in the present economic
context of economic reforms
the maintenance and effective implementation
of government programmes
for the poor is quite
important.
In a paper entitled "Minimum wages
in agriculture: a review of Indian experience,"
Parthasarathy notes that
such registration pushes wages upward
in backward areas and therefore
it is very welcome.
The paper contains a review of
waged registration. Six of the other papers
in the section on policy environment
and state intervention have an
empirical bias examining operational
issues and the impact of self-employment
programmes.
Kurian and Rajeev have critically
analysed self-employment and wage
employment in their joint paper. But
Rohini Nayyar, in a separate paper, has
given an assessment of wage employment
programmes only.
They considered how all these programmes
can be made more effective
and what kind of action is needed.
Singh has analysed state intervention
and tribal workers in Bihar.
Piet Terhal and Indira Hirway have
evaluated the employment guarantee
programmes in Maharashtra and Gujarat.
They are of the view that international
support has been very welcome
though the exact shape of India's social
security policy should be determined
within its own polity.
Guarav Datt Sudhakar Reddy and
Swaminathan have examined respectively
"Poverty alleviation through rural
public works: the experience of
Maharashtra's employment guarantee
through rural public works: the experience
of Maharashtra's employment
guarantee scheme" and "Operationalising
entitlement of the poor: the case
of rural employment guarantee
scheme of Andhra Pradesh."
Datt has argued that schemes like
the one on employment guarantee in
Maharashtra in a setting where there is
relative surplus labour and poor infrastructure
development can be a
success. Reddy and Swaminathan feel
that Andhra Pradesh's scheme has a
better design
The third and concluding section
has discussed mobilisation for empowerment.
There are five papers in this section,
which have analysed the role and impact
of mobilisation by union political
party and non-governmental organisations
on rural labour markets. Gill
has discussed many issues regarding
the unionisation of agricultural labour
in India.
He has noted that this has resulted
in a multi-pronged intervention involving
issues of economic demands,
social securities and atrocities on the
poor and the weaker sections. In spite
of it the paper notes that positive results
have not yet become pervasive.
There are also three case studies on
unionisation of agriculture/rural labour
in the states of Kerala, Andhra
Pradesh and Bihar by Kannan, Reddy,
Sharma and Kumar, who have gone in
depth in analysing the matter of the
impact on rural labour market.
Indeed these studies reveal that mobilisation
as a whole has positive impacts
on rural labour, on the
prevention of atrocities on rural labour,
especially on the weaker section.
Kannan has studied union intervention
in rural labour in seven sections.
He concludes by taking that unionisation
is not adequate and employment
generation is more important for
which the state has to provide water
and development and unionisation of
programmes of rural industrialisation.
The third chapter by Narasimha
Reddy has elaborated the experience
of Andhra Pradesh and pointed out
how there has been a shift in emphasis
from general demand for higher wages
to various other aspects like identifying
the land and illegal occupation etc.
The fourth chapter on Bihar has pointed
out that the government and nongovernmental
agencies for helping the
poor to a much greater extent can use
the current trends in the present
mobilisation.
The last and concluding chapter by
Naveen Chandra and Narashima Reddy
on voluntary action and rural markets
in India has summed up the
positive role played by non-governmental
organisations which along with
state machinery and trade unions can
play a very positive role in raising the
living standards of the rural poor. They
have given many illustrations of the
possibilities.
The book is a very useful collection
of articles and empirical studies covering
different parts of India and sectors
of rural economy and therefore
research workers and those involved in
policy making and implementation
will find it well worth reading.
C. B. PADMANABHAN
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