In rural India, gender equality in wages is still a distant dream | Business Line

In rural India, gender equality in wages is still a distant dream | Business Line

Online comments posted on July 17, 2013 (edited version appears on web)


As there is no adequate policy support to make things better, these disparities remains fodder for research and analysis by an ‘elite’ class and occasional pre-election lament by a political community who live in a world insulated from poverty and deprivation. There has been some effort at the national level to have a realistic prescribed (enforceable) minimum wage linked to cost of living for ensuring uniform norms for payments for work done, initiated in the context of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA).

But this addresses just one aspect of the anomalies in hiring labour. Other factors which include built-in social disparities like uneven development, varying literacy and poverty levels and several geographical and political factors. According to one estimate(quoted in An Uncertain Glory by Jean Dreze& Amartya Sen), the average daily wages/earnings of casual labourers in the employable age group (15-69) in 5 states in 2009-10(Rs/day)were:
State
Rural-Male
Rural-Female
Urban-Male
Urban-Female
Assam
94
75
116
82
Karnataka
97
63
123
68
Kerala
227
119
237
121
Madhya Pradesh
74
58
89
75
Maharashtra
86
58
122
58
West Bengal
88
66
99
78

Not much research may be needed to go to the root causes for inter-state and rural-urban migration and for stagnant human development indicators as also the prevalent unrest in rural India.

The position calls for aggressive policy intervention to address disparities. The political blame game or the shifting of responsibilities from Centre to states or vice versa may lead to irretrievable catastrophic situation, whatever Growth Story we try to market to the outside world.

M G Warrier, Mumbai

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