Dimapur
Nagaland remembers workers on the fringes of its local economy
Dimapur, Feb. 20 (EMN): In probably for the first time for the state of Nagaland, the administration has assured to conduct a survey about the population of manual scavengers in the state and their “wellbeing.”
Innumerable announcements and inaugurations highlighting equally numerous welfare schemes are a common feature of news publishing in this small Northeast region state, where press releases in effect dogfight for newspaper space.
But this first nod for the ‘Safai Karamcharis’—Hindi for manual scavengers—as assured by the state’s principal administrator, Chief Secretary Temjen Toy, to a visiting team of a central welfare commission from Delhi, was real news.
The chief secretary told media persons during a press conference on February 18 in Kohima about conducting a survey on the number of sanitation workers in Nagaland, ‘not only for reporting but for their uplift and wellbeing.’
The state’s administration hosted Manhar Valjibhai Zala, the chairman of the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis, of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, and two of his officials at the Secretariat in capital town Kohima.
A Safai Karamchari is a person who engages in, or is employed for sanitation work. Their work is long and tedious, and hazardous. Basically, they do work not anyone would. Manual scavenging is a term used to describe manual removal of untreated human excreta. The practice is prohibited by law.
Toy told reporters that these workers have now ‘gone away,’ and that reports were received from the state deputy commissioners saying that ‘there are no manual scavengers’ in Nagaland.
Nonetheless, he admitted that ‘a lot of things have been clarified’ with the visit of the commission’s officials. He stated that a proper survey will be conducted to find out how many manual scavengers are there in the state and how to address their issues.
The official admitted too that the authorities have not been addressing the Safai Karamchari as a targeted group for welfare initiatives. He assured to look into the section of workers as a targeted group from now on, not only for ‘reporting’ but for the ‘uplift of their wellbeing.’
The statement was a noteworthy break in the monotony of Nagaland’s development narrative that has always been punctuated by the wearisome Indo-Naga political issue, passive aggressive social tensions, and the state’s customary angst against its impoverished roads.
Equally significant is the statement being a laudable nod to a social section that is barely even in the casual notice of a state obsessed with government jobs, and constant clamour for development attention.
Manhar Valjibhai Zala was in Nagaland to evaluate the condition of the workers and study their socio, economic and educational development.
An apparent reference was made to the stigma of being a Safai Karamchari whose work invokes uncomfortable perceptions that intermingle with issues of caste and discrimination: He lauded the Naga communities for their harbouring no discrimination based on caste. Everyone is treated equally in the community, the reporters were told, and that ‘there were no deaths related to manual scavenging’ in Nagaland.
Adding to being stigmatized due to the nature of their work, the Safai Karamchari’s profession is hazardous. According to the annual report of the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis at least 50 persons in India have died cleaning sewers in the first six months of 2019 alone.
The commission directed the chief secretary to constitute a state monitoring committee, and district vigilance committees besides instating sub-divisional vigilance monitoring agencies in accordance with the Manual Scavenging Act of 2013.
Zala said safety equipments had been distributed to some workers. He asked the authorities to provide protective gears and safety equipments to all Karamcharis to protect them from incidents and health hazards in the course of their work.
Likewise, the commission is reported to have directed the authorities to provide minimum wages and benefits including leave benefits, safety equipments, housing facilities, and medical facilities to the workers.
Population
The chief secretary was not entirely wrong when he said the state had no manual scavengers. They used to be a common sight—including rag pickers who scavenge mostly at night are a regular feature in urban Dimapur—even during the past recent years in the state.
There are no current data concerning their population in the districts including business center Dimapur and capital town Kohima. According to the Socio Economic Caste Census 2011 of the ministry of Rural Development, Nagaland had 409 legally bonded labour, and 274 manual scavengers forming 0.10% of 2,84,310 households.
Generally, a marked majority, if not all, of the workforce in the state’s unorganised labour sector is dominated by Schedule Caste / Others members. Scavenging is generally associated with migrant labourers, one basis of the chief secretary’s contention that manual scavengers in the state have ‘gone away now and….received reports from the state deputy commissioners saying that there are no manual scavengers.’
It is believed that their numbers decreased with the introduction of mobile cesspool cleaners in the municipalities during the mid-2000s coupled with increasing health advocacies, government-sponsored sanitation programmes such as the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, and a general movement toward proper waste management practices. Rag-pickers, scrap metal scavengers, and migrant house cleaners, however, are not uncommon in Nagaland.
A welfare input or two
The government’s statement highlights a growing, if slow, attention for a dedicated policy for the largely ignored unorganised services and labour sector in the state. So far, policy imperatives have been limited to a few central schemes that the state’s Labour administration implements.
On Feb. 14, the 13th Nagaland Legislative Assembly was given updates about the unorganised workers sector in the state and the welfare programmes that are being implemented.
The Labour department told the assembly that the central government’s pension scheme for unorganised workers, the Pradhan Mantri Shram Yogi Maan-dhan, was being implemented to ensure old age protection for unorganised workers who are currently earning below INR 15,000 per month. Another is the National Pension Scheme for Traders and Self Employed Pensions or NPS-Traders for small business, and self-employed persons.
In Jul 28 2019, Eastern Mirror had reported that out of an estimated more than seven lakh workers in the agriculture and general unorganised sector in the state of Nagaland, only a total of 1, 035 people had registered for the pension scheme.
A district labour official for Dimapur had told this reporter in reply to a query about the demographics and population of labourers in the state’s unorganised sector. The labour officer had said that the state’s government establishments do not have data from surveys or studies that may explain categories of labourers, their sectors and even their economic demographics.
Nonetheless, the authorities seem to be gradually mapping at least some of the sector’s workers. A recent development is that the Labour authorities are working on process to register another group of the sector, domestic workers and helpers, under the Indian Trade Unions Act of 1926. The move is to institute appropriate social security benefits for registered beneficiaries.
Construction workers’ welfare board
The Labour department has stated in updates that till date, the welfare board has been able to register 6,661 workers in the state.
The Labour department is also “entrusted to enforce” the Building and Other Construction Workers’ (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act of 1996. The authorities have also constituted the Nagaland Building and Other Construction Workers’ Welfare Board, for workers in the construction sector.
The welfare board is providing social security schemes to registered workers. The schemes include the Tools Grant, Insurance Cover under the Aam Admi Bima Yojana, medical assistance, children education allowance and maternity benefits for registered female workers and wives of registered workers.
This article is written by Al Ngullie. It is one of a series of reports published in Eastern Mirror as part of the National Foundation of India fellowship, New Delhi.