By Bhogtoram Mawroh
“According to the data released by Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE),
unemployment in the country was lowest in Chhattisgarh (0.4%) followed by Meghalaya (2%), Maharashtra (2.2%) and Gujarat and Odisha (2.6% each).”
A few days ago I happened to meet an old friend who I had not met for a while. I had booked a Rapido to my office and to my surprise the person who came to pick me up was this friend. Since this was the first time we were meeting at my place, I offered to make tea for him. But he declined stating that he was in a hurry and wanted to make a few more trips before retiring for the day. He had already finished a 12-hour night shift in his first job after which he was ferrying passengers for extra income. Talking to him I came to know that this extra income was very critical for running his household. In spite of him working for more than a decade in a prestigious hospital his salary is woefully low. The extra income helps but it is still not enough for a decent standard of living. That can happen if he were to find a job which pays more. But at a time when jobs are not easily available, he has chosen to stay put rather than leave his current job. And in order to make up for the low salary he is ferrying passengers after his regular working hours. Put together, the hours spent in both the regular and part time job, my friend is working almost 16 hours a day. This is way beyond what decent work prescribes. And the frustrating part is that he is still falling short.
But this is not just the story of my friend but a condition experienced by many in Meghalaya. According to the data released by Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), unemployment in the country was lowest in Chhattisgarh (0.4%) followed by Meghalaya (2%), Maharashtra (2.2%) and Gujarat and Odisha (2.6% each). What these numbers don’t tell is the quality of the jobs. People don’t make enough from one job and they have to take up multiple jobs to make ends meet. That is the sorry state of affairs not just in Meghalaya but throughout the country as well. The response to this situation from the Governments, Central or State is also not helping.
There is a narrative being pushed that citizens should not be looking to the State for creating jobs. Instead they should become entrepreneurs and create job for themselves. To paraphrase, “people must take destiny into our own hands and create their own future”. Put this way, it can give anyone goosebumps. Even I got goosebumps. However, the reality is a little banal. The story ‘Union Budget 2022: Why the informal sector needs govt. support’ in BusinessToday.In published on the 19th January 2021 revealed that the informal sector, which constitutes workers in the category of self-employed or those who have “taken destiny into their own hands”, already makes up 80% of the Indian labour force producing 50% of the GDP. More than 90% of these workers have an income of less than 10,000 rupees or below. Despite what the Government, State and Centre, claim they are not producing enough good quality jobs. Now they want to reduce the existing jobs as well.
The argument for this policy narrative is that the Government has limited financial resources or put very simply “there is no money”. But is that really true? Understood simply the amount of money in the economy is represented by the size of the GDP, i.e., the monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced and sold in a specific time period. The Government appropriates this value through taxes (direct and indirect), fees and other measures. Based on the argument of “there is no money” the economy should be contracting resulting in a fall of revenues for the State. However, except for the pandemic affected year of 2020 when GDP became negative, the average growth rate from 1990 to 2021 was a positive 5.91%. Compared to it, the average population growth during the same period was 1.58%. What’s more, the gap between the two is growing – the population growth rate has declined from 2.16% in 1990 to 0.80% in 2021, while the GDP figures have risen from 5.53% to 8.95%. So if more money is being generated in the economy per person and more will be in the future (hopefully), how is it that “there is no money”? But this story of numbers is a boring story; the human story is a more engaging one.
The people who are being tasked to drive the narrative that because “there is no money” “people should take their destiny into their own hands” are those who themselves are fortunate to have a regular job with a pay slip at the end of every month. Some of these are government officials while others are armchair experts who preach about entrepreneurship while they themselves are far from one. Rather than being the dynamic and exciting entrepreneur who creates jobs for themselves and others they are boring office workers with a 9 to 5 job. But that would not be a totally fair statement as some of them are actually investing their salary into businesses of various sorts. I have only one request to such individuals: the quality of their main profession should not suffer because of the extra work they are putting for creating wealth for themselves and the economy. For the experts I hope that in time they will become internationally recognized domain experts who will be called for important consultations where world changing ideas are discussed and deliberated. As for the government officers I hope there are no delays regarding the implementation or the quality of work of which they are entrusted with. But if none of these happen, should not these champions of “people should take their destiny into their own hands” concentrate on doing what they are paid for and be boring rather than trying to become dynamic and exciting. It’s just a humble request. Please think about it.
When it comes to those who are already entrepreneurs, and I happen to know a few of them, things are not rosy since they have “taken destiny into their own hands”. One of the common complaints I hear from them is there are certain individuals or groups who hoard all the contracts handed out by the Government. The reason is because such individuals/groups are well connected, i.e., they are part of the Burom (the word for respectable in Khasi) class who controls all the levers of power. A very important feature of this class is that they are highly ‘inbred’. They go to same schools, drink in the same bar, are related to each other and are found in lucrative government or entrepreneurial positions all over the state. Once a certain member of this class is able to attain an important position, rest assured the funds for the exciting entrepreneurial adventure will only go to their inbred brethrens. With time this concentration of resources and power only becomes stronger.
What all this also means is that social mobility in Meghalaya is very low. A member of the working class will always find it difficult to break the privilege of the Burom class making the members of this class akin to the upper castes while the rest of the population are transformed into the lower castes. As a result, the egalitarianism of our indigenous people’s tribal society is getting eroded if it’s not already gone. What is the way forward for the working class? I believe solidarity is one of the first things that need to be built as the Burom class enjoys pitting members of the working class against each other. For example the policemen who fired tear gas on the protesting contractual teachers, and some of whom were reported to have challenged the latter to a fight by taunting them, are also members of the working class. But because they need to earn the respect of the Burom class in order improve their own lot they are antagonistic to the cause of their true brethrens. The way to a decent life is, therefore, long and hard for the working class. I hope this will change and I wish all of us the best for the future.