How does India reverse these trends?

The answers are known: Proactively create quality jobs, fill vacant sanctioned posts, ensure statutory minimum wages and social security cover – in government, private corporate and informal sectors. This would mean overhauling economic policies and making systemic changes, particularly to address what the CEA flagged.

But here are a few easy steps to make a sound beginning.

1. Statutory minimum wages for MGNREGS workers

On December 5-6, 2024, hundreds of MGNREGS workers gathered at Jantar Mantar to demand fair wages (among others) – an annual ritual. Theirs is a centrally sponsored scheme in which the Centre pays the full wage (material component is shared 75:25 with states/UTs).

Until 2017, their wage was linked to the statutory minimum wages of states/UTs for agricultural labour. This changed and the Centre de-linked it following the Nagesh Singh committee’s report. Set up in 2016, this committee invalidated earlier practice on three spacious grounds: (a) wages for agricultural labour is “a time rate” while that for MGNREGS is “a piece rate” (b) difficult to align the two rates because of wide variations in the schedule of rates (SoRs) across states, and (c) no wage discrimination exists between male and female workers in MGNREGS, while that is so for agricultural workers (women paid less than men).

How many MGNREGS workers don’t get minimum wages?

“Active” MGNREGS workers stand at 132.5 million, as on December 7, 2024. Average number MGNREGS workers in the past four fiscals of FY21-FY24 is 97.2 million. Their number during FY25 (up to December 7, 2024) is 65.9 million.

In FY25, average MGNREGS wage is ₹248.8 – less than ₹279 the wage for them fixed by the Centre for FY25 and also less than the Centre’s statutory minimum of ₹450-500 (unskilled agricultural workers) applicable from October 1, 2024.

The Centre violates its own laws to deny statutory minimum wages to workers hired under its own schemes (more details follow). It also violates the Supreme Court order of 1983 (Sanjit Roy vs Rajasthan government) which read: “The State cannot be permitted to take advantage of the helpless condition of the affected persons and extract labour or service from them on payment of less than the minimum wage”. The court called it “forced labour”.

2. Pay wages, not ‘honourarium’ or ‘incentives’

The Centre doesn’t recognise millions of workers hired under its own schemes (all long-term employment) as ‘employees’. So, it pays them “honorarium” and “incentives”, instead of statutory minimum wages – like under the PM POSHAN, NHM and NRLM etc.

On November 25, 2024, it told the Lok Sabha that cook-cum-helpers (CCHs) under the PM POSHAN (earlier called mid-day meal scheme) are paid monthly “honorarium” of ₹1,000 – for 15 years since this amount was fixed in 2009. Many states do give additional honorarium – ranging from ₹500 to ₹11,000-11,500 (Kerala and Tamil Nadu) but not all do so (many north-eastern states and UTs like Delhi).

The number of CCHs hired is not known but is likely to be substantially as they serve meals to students of Class I-VIII across the country.

This scheme has another component – “Anganwadi services” for pre-school children. This one employed 2.4 million Anganwadi Workers (AWWs) and Anganwadi Helpers (AWHs) as on 31st December 2023. They get a maximum “honorarium” of ₹4,500 and ₹2,250, respectively, plus monthly performance incentive of ₹250-500.

The AWWs and AWHs too routinely gather in New Delhi to demand fair wage (last on March 4, 2024).

Then, there are about 2 million ASHA and ANM workers (as on Aug 14, 2024) – employed under the National Health Mission (NHM). They too routinely hold protests to demand fair wage (last in New Delhi in November 2024).

They did yeoman service tracking and treating Covid-19 patients.

Their monthly “incentive” is ₹2,000 per month”, plus “performance-based incentives” ranging from ₹1 to ₹500 (except for handling TB patients).

Similarly, the NRLM employs a large number of community resource persons (CRPs), livelihood resource persons (CMSA), community mobilisers, activists, trainers, book keepers etc. who are given “honorarium” ranging from ₹500-5,000 (fixed in 2017). Their number is also not known.

3. Respect professionalism and make regular employment

The Centre is incrementally hiring workers on contract and causal basis to save on wages, but their data is not available. The latest addition is four-year contractual “Agniveers”. It compromises national security by giving six-moth training and compulsorily retiring 75% of them.

4. Fill central government vacancies

No official data exists about the total vacancies in sanctioned posts under central ministries, departments, schools, hospitals (including PHCs and CHCs), CPSUs, CAPFs and defence forces (Army, Navy and Air Force about which it refused information for the first time in the Rajya Sabha reply of August 5, 2024 citing national interest). The Congress said the total vacancies were 3 million in its 2024 manifesto. Filling these vacancies would give regular wages to those many.

5. Implement Wage and Social Security Codes

The Code on Wages came in 2019 promising universal minimum wages and the Code on Social Security in 2020 promising universal social security cover (extending to unorganised sector, including gig workers). But both remain on paper.

A whitepaper on gig economy, released on November 28, 2024, said gig workers are likely to rise to 90 million by 2030. The Fairwork India’s October 2024 report had found only two of 11 firms engaging gig work in India are giving “local minimum wage after costs” but none “local living wage after costs”. There is little to celebrate gig work or for Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to romanticise the success of ‘quick commerce’ (“India’s businesses, particularly the start-ups, especially quick commerce, for instance, are truly a one-of-a-kind innovation that only India has.”).

The US and Europe recognise the pitfalls and have legislated measures to treat gig workers as ‘employees’ (not ‘partners’) with rights. It is time for India to do so.

If the Centre operationalises these two codes, 442 million workers who don’t get regular wage/salary (78.3% of 565 million workers) would be benefitted.

6. Use e-shram portal to deliver actual services

The e-shram portal does nothing more than register migrant and unorganised workers.

On December 5, 2024, three different questions were asked in the Rajya Sabha about its utility but none of the answers listed benefits. All three answers repeated the same: 304.3 million unorganised workers have been registered and 12 central schemes have been linked.

wage stagnation

Higher wages, jobs formalisation key to boosting economy