New Delhi: For decades successive governments have put agriculture at the heart of the growth agenda, but farm income continued to remain abysmally low. A report by a premier labour body has revealed that daily earning of agriculture labourers increased by only 48 per cent in nearly two decades.
In contrast, the daily earnings of our legislators increased by a staggering 98 per cent during the same period, matching that of highly paid professionals and senior managers.
While the real average daily wages for a skilled agricultural labourer was Rs 120 in 1993-94, it became Rs 177 in 2011-12. For legislators, senior officials and managers, it increased to Rs 1,052 in 2011-12 from Rs 530 in 1993-94, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said in a recent report.
For professionals, it increased by 90 per cent.
The plight of the machine operators and assemblers were no better either as their daily earnings remained as much as that of a agricultural labourers and fishery workers.
So what has led to the impressive jump in the daily wages in other sectors?
According to ILO, the pay commission was a major contributing factor. Though its recommendations are limited to government employees, the cascading effect was felt in private sectors too. “The ratio between the best-paid occupation and the lowest ranked was 7.2 in 1993-94, increased to 10.7 in 2004-05 and declined to 7.6 in 2011-12,” the report states”, it said.
A comparison of the daily wages of various occupations showed that a shop keeper earned more (Rs 446) than an agricultural labourer who toiled hard in the fileds under the scorching sun to sustain his family income.
Significantly, the report said casual workers in the agriculture sector experienced higher wage growth as compared to no-agriculture casual workers such as those engaged in construction.
The ILO report, quoting experts, stated that the high growth in the construction sector GDP has resulted in demand for construction workers, which has in turn led to a scarcity of workers in rural areas and a resultant rise in agricultural wages.
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