Claims

          ….Income of the rural masses has increased

          ….Budgetary allocation for MGREGS has been increased

          ….Rural workers now enjoyed social security

          ….All sections of society are getting an equal share of resources

          ….Those who grow food, the anna daatas are empowered

          ….Pension schemes and social security for agricultural and migrant workers

Truth

Neoliberal economic policies pursued by the BJP led Central government deepened the agrarian crisis, resulting in huge unemployment in rural India.

Manual work in the farm sector has reduced to minimal levels with the increased use of labour-displacing technologies. Wages for major agricultural and non-agricultural occupations declined by 3 per cent per annum from 2013-14 to 2018-19.

The main reasons for the decline in rural wages were demonetization, roll out of GST, reduction in budgetary allocation for social security schemes like MGNREGS, and cut in subsidies. A sharp decline in the growth of wage rates for major rural occupations at the all-India level was seen from the time of the lockdown but it had started much before the COVID-19 pandemic, in June 2019.

The Ministry of Finance, in its Economic Survey 2022-23, highlighted a negative growth in real rural wages (that is, rural wages adjusted for inflation) due to elevated inflation between April and November 2022.

A recently released study by the Reserve Bank of India has revealed that the workers in the three BJP-ruled states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh are receiving daily wages much below the national average. The farm workers in Gujarat get a daily wage of Rs 241.9 – hundred rupees below the national average of Rs 345.7; Madhya Pradesh has the lowest daily wage at Rs 221.9. Kerala, on the other hand, has the highest daily wage to workers – Rs 764.3 for farm workers and Rs 852.5 for construction workers.

Despite proving its worth for the livelihood of the rural poor and the rural economy, the Modi-led BJP government is working to kill off the MGNREGS.

BJP led Union government has continuously denied adequate allocation of funds in successive union budgets. The overall allocation for MGNREGS as a proportion of the total budget has decreased. MGNREGS had 1.98 per cent of the total budget for the financial year 2013-14. It came down to 1.33 per cent of the total budget for 2023-24.

According to data provided by LibTech India, a consortium of academics and activists, 7.6 crore job cards have been deleted from the system over the last 21 months.

There is zero increase in comparison to the revised estimates for the current financial year (2023-24). In the interim budget, Rs 86000 crores has been allocated for MGNREGS while for the current year, the total expenditure on the MGNREGS so far has been 88,309.72 crores.

As a result, despite the guarantee of 100 days of work, average working days provided never crossed 50 except during the pandemic year 2020-2021 (51.52 days) under the Modi regime. Last year the average working days were only 47 days. The average wages paid to workers under MGNREGS are 208 in 2021-2022, 216.57 in 2022-23 which is against the recommendation of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Rural Development. When payments are delayed, real wages see a decrease.

The neoliberal approach of the Modi government not only considers MGNREGS unnecessary but also a hurdle for the economic growth of the country.

The very concept of the social welfare State is unacceptable to both foreign and Indian capital. The crisis is so acute that agricultural workers are forced to commit suicide. This shows the stressful conditions they are living in. According to the NCRB report last year, 5563 agricultural workers committed suicide. Overall, 40,685 farm laborers have been forced to commit suicide since 2014. The policies of BJP have miserably failed to address this alarming situation.

The most crucial resource, land, for which landless labourers and other sections of the rural poor have been waiting for years, is now being handed over to corporate by the BJP government.

Data from the surveys of the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) shows that about 41 per cent of the rural households did not own any agricultural land in 2018-19. Concentration of land in a few hands still remains a reality in India’s villages and NSSO data for 2018-19 shows that the top 20 percent of rural households owned 76 per cent of all land.

The government is pooling land for various purposes in the name of development projects the primary beneficiaries of which are the corporate. This is displacing small and marginal farmers. Even agricultural workers are losing whatever small pieces of land that they cultivated.

Farmers are getting an insignificant amount of compensation for the acquired land but agricultural workers are losing their employment opportunity on this land without being compensated in any way.

For the BJP government empowering Annadatas does not include agricultural workers. The most propagated PM-KISAN scheme does not include agricultural workers and they don’t receive any assistance from the government.

Even the meagre benefits of compensation of crop insurance doesn’t cover sharecroppers and agricultural workers. Similar is the case of the system of debt and loan.

Except for Kerala, neither the central, nor any other state government have any specific scheme for paying social pensions to agricultural and rural workers. The Kerala  Agricultural Workers Welfare Fund Board ensures pension for all registered labourers. Only the LDF-led Kerala government ensures strong public sector hospitals and education institutions.

The Modi government has created much hype around the Pradhan Mantri Shram Yogi Maan-Dhan (PM-SYM) pension scheme launched in 2019. This includes workers of the unorganized sectors including agricultural workers. There is a provision for the payment of a monthly pension of Rs. 3000/- after attaining the age of 60 years. Under this scheme, a 50 per cent monthly contribution is payable by the beneficiary. Only 49,25,155 beneficiaries are registered in this scheme but not even one has availed of any benefit due to the age limit.

During the pandemic, the Supreme Court intervened on behalf of the migrant workers and the Union government launched the e-Shram portal in August 2021 with the objective of creating a National Database of Unorganised Workers but without specifying any social benefits. The corporate media created a hype around this portal but, in reality, not a single worker has benefited from this scheme.

SUPPORT THE RIGHTS OF THE AGRICULTURAL WORKERS!

DEFEAT BJP!

Published by Communist Party of India (Marxist)