“Most unorganised workers paid poorly” (The Hindu)
"An overwhelming 79 per cent of workers in the unorganised sector live with an income of less than Rs. 20 a day, according to the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS).
"A report on 'Conditions of Work and Promotion of Livelihoods in Unorganised Sector,' released by the Commission here on Thursday, says over 394.9 million workers (86 per cent of the working population) belong to the unorganised sector and work under 'utterly deplorable' conditions with 'extremely few livelihood options.'
"The report says that 88 per cent of the Scheduled Tribes [oppressed tribals] and the Scheduled Castes [untouchables], 80 per cent of the Other Backward Classes [other oppressed castes] and 85 per cent of Muslims belong to the category of 'poor and vulnerable,' who earn less than Rs. 20 a day.
Rs. 20 is less than fifty cents a day. In 2004 the National Commission of Rural Labour determined that the minimum subsistence wage was Rs. 66. The NCEUS report described above found that a total of 836 million people in India, or 77 per cent of the population, including wage-earners and non-wage-earners, were living on less than Rs. 20 a day.
"Unorganized" workers are those who do casual labor that does not pay regular wages and carries no legal protections. The term does not refer to workers not represented by a trade union, as it does in the U.S. and Britain: most workers in the "organized sector" are not unionized. Unorganized workers include piece workers, migrant workers, vendors, and unskilled laborers in quarries, kilns, and farms.
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