https://countercurrents.org/2022/04/demonetisation-gst-and-covid-doom-indias-handloom-sector/
The crisis has sharpened manifold, across the beleaguered handloom sector, since demonetisation was unleashed in late 2016 by the current government without a warning, followed by a repressive GST, which hit the entire small scale and informal industry in India. This sector comprises the largest mass of unorganized workers, without basic, fundamental rights, floating in a cruel and exploitative market dominated by the predators of the neo-liberal economy, backed by the current regime as much as by the early UPA government led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who was a classical market fundamentalist.
The arrival of the deadly virus in the summer of 2020, followed by a draconian lockdown announced with no warning yet again, by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, only worsened the suffering of the informal sector, including thousands of migrant workers, homeless, thirsty and emaciated, left to their destiny on scorching summer highways, escaping the pandemic, but eternally trapped in the vicious circle of joblessness and poverty. The handloom sector, like the rest of the informal sector, suffered yet another devastating blow to its struggling economy, with no government intervention or healing touch reaching out to them, or their families.
According to the Handloom Census, 67 per cent of households employed in handloom work earn less than Rs 5,000 a month. This was stated by Smriti Zubin Irani, Minister of Textiles, in a written reply during a Rajya Sabha session. Just about 1 percent of handloom households are earning Rs 20,000 per month.
16/04/2022