F14-Poverty
The Rajasthan Minimum Guaranteed Income Bill doubles the minimum pension to Rs 1000 per month for all elderly widowed and disabled, with an inbuilt guaranteed annual increment of 15% per year.
The law has an enhanced entitlement of 25 days per rural family for work under MGNREGA, and an entitlement of 125 days of work under an urban employment programme.
1. Ever since the advocacy of the Right to Work began, there has been a consistent demand for the State to put in place universal urban and rural employment programmes. While the campaign gained a victory with the passage of the NREGA in 2005, the demand for a legal entitlement to urban employment remained unfulfilled then. COVID and the subsequent lockdowns reminded us of the dire need for an income based social security for urban workers and reinvigorated our advocacy for an urban employment programme. Multiple States like Jharkhand, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh, Odisha, Tamil Nadu introduced urban employment schemes subsequent to COVID, but with the imminent passage of the Minimum Income Guarantee Bill here, Rajasthan would become the first State in the country to have a legal entitlement for urban employment. It would also be the first State in the country to enhance the legal entitlement of NREGA by 25 additional days at its own cost by force of law.
2. Since the formation of Pension Parishad in 2009, we have been campaigning for a legal entitlement for pension that is universal, indexed to inflation and amounting to half the minimum wage through continual dharnas. The insensitivity of the Central Government to these demands and the plight of elderly has been evident with their allocation to the National Social Assistance Programme being limited to Rs 200 per month for BPL families since 2007. Yet again, the Rajasthan Minimum Income Guarantee Bill would become the first instance in the country of a State guaranteeing a universal minimum pension indexed to inflation by Law.
True, the government has launched several schemes to eradicate poverty in the poorer areas. But a close look at the nature and quality of this reduction against the money available, reveals that poverty alleviation schemes like free rations, gifts of cycles or laptops to students and cash handouts can not be sustainable in the long run.
by Mrinal Pande
India has been ranked 111 among 125 countries in the Global Hunger Index report released by two European agencies on October 12, 2023. India slipped four positions as compared to last year. https://thewire.in/health/india-ranks-111th-among-125-countries-in-global-hunger-index-report
Four factors were taken into account for calculating the GHI scores: undernourishment (refers to the entire population – both children and adults); child stunting (share of children who have low height for their age); child under-5 mortality; and child wasting (children who have low weight for their height). All these indicators are components of the universally agreed UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The Indian government has rejected this report this year too, like it has done on previous occasions. Issuing a statement on October 12, the government has termed the methodology of the report preparation faulty, and has raised concerns about the selection of the four parameters used.
“Three out of the four indicators used for calculation of the index are related to the health of children and cannot be representative of the entire population,” the government said.
by Banjot Kaur
13/10/2023