The Union Labour and Employment Minister, Bhupender Yadav, has recently revealed crucial data about the unorganised workers of India who are now registering on the government’s E-Shram portal. He said that according to current registration updates, 53.8 per cent registered unorganised workers on the portal are women, while 46.12 per cent are men. Further, 15.43 per cent of the registered people are between the age group of 18-40 years.
The E-Shram portal is a first-of-its-kind national database of workers in the unorganised sector in India. The unorganised sector represents around 92 per cent of India’s workforce, and yet, faces immense obstacles. A large section of this workforce, as the E-Shram portal’s data reveals clearly, are women. The launch of the E-Shram portal in 2021 is expected to understand these obstacles and help surmount them, and the work seems to be moving forward in full force.
“About six months ago, work began for the registration of unorganised sector labour, and in that time India has over 27 crore registrations of these workers on the E-Shram portal. And the biggest thing is that unorganised sector workers registered from over 400 occupations,” Yadav explained. He also added that most of the registrations on the portal have been from the agricultural sector.
The Minister also stated that the E-Shram cards issued to those workers who register on the portal will be linked to Aadhar cards. “Biggest benefit of this linking is that unorganised sector workers will get pensions, insurance, education, health and other benefits,” Yadav explained. He also added that thanks to the new labour code being introduced in the country, registered unorganised sector workers are not only entering a more formalised sector, but also getting minimum salaries. “All the incentives have been implemented on ground level and have reached everyone. This has increased the confidence in financial growth and development among poor people,” he said while adding that in the agricultural sector, 22-27 per cent of formalisation is being done by extending credit to farmers.