Counting Workers In

Context: Labour ministry is set to build a new database of migrant workers.

Problems associated with migrant labourers:

• Holes in the safety net: g. difficulties faced by them during Pandemic led to their exodus from cities.
• Lack of information on inter-state migrants: Due to poor implementation of Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, 1979.
  • The Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, 1979, requires all establishments who hired inter-state migrants to be registered, as well as all contractors who recruited these workers to be licensed.

Significance of the database to be created:

• Inclusion of the informal economy.
• It will use existing databases of government schemes such as the Mahatma Gandhi Employment Guarantee Act and the one nation-one ration card to create a unique registration of migrant workers. 
  • It will use the Aadhaar platform to address the issue of duplication.

Steps to take before creating a new database:

• Acknowledge the issues of intra-state migrants: apart from inter-state migrants.
• Provide a comprehensive definition for migrants: essential because both long-term and circular migrants are in crisis (Present definitions used by National Sample Survey and Census are different)
• Find a way to merge existing databases of States: Difficult to merge as the software and structures of data storage are different. 
• Examine the issue of portability of benefits across states: Merely creating a database of workers will not be enough.