Ministry slams Oxfam inequality index

The 2020 Oxfam inequality index, which placed India at rank 151 in terms of workers’ rights and 129 overall out of 158 countries, lacked clarity and did not take into account provisions of the four new labour codes, Labour and Employment Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar informed the Lok Sabha.

The rank assigned to India and methodology adopted is not clear, and does not take into account the entire gamut of provisions in the Indian legislations relevant to protection of labour rights, particularly relating to formation of trade unions.
India was not a signatory to two International Labour Organisation conventions on the freedom of association and protection of the right to organise (C87) and the right to organise and collective bargaining (C98), the principles of the conventions were “available to workers”.
Also, the methodology does not take into account the various provisions that have been provided in the Labour Codes
The Code on Wages, 2019; the Industrial Relations Code, 2020; the Code on Social Security, 2020 and the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 had been passed by Parliament and notified.
He said the four codes, which subsume 29 Central labour laws, “extend social protection to workers, including in unorganised sectors in respect of extending statutory minimum wages to all, formulation of schemes for benefit of workers to provide for healthcare benefits, Employees’ Provident Fund, Pension and Employees’ Deposit-Linked Insurance, etc.

The Index ranked countries measuring their policies and actions in three areas that it said are proven to be directly related to reducing inequality:
- Public services (health, education and social protection)
- Taxation
- Workers’ rights
Nigeria, Bahrain and India, which experienced the world’s fastest-growing outbreak of Covid-19, were among the world’s worst-performing countries in tackling inequality going into the pandemic.

Overall, India ranked 129 in the CRI index out of 158 countries on government policies, and actions in areas of public services of education, health, social protection, taxation, and workers’ rights.
India slipped from rank 141 in the year 2018 to 151 in the year 2020 with weak labour rights and high incidence of vulnerable employment.
Highest presence of the informal sector for men was in Uttar Pradesh at 86.9% and for women was in Andhra Pradesh at 73.6%.
In terms of its public services, it ranked 141.
India has been ranked 19 on the taxation pillar.

Exploiting Labours in Covid:
Several state governments in India have used Covid-19 as a pretext to increase daily working hours from 8 to 12 hours a day and suspend minimum pay legislation, devastating the livelihoods of millions of poor workers now battling hunger.
Low Health Budget:
India’s health budget was the fourth lowest with half of its population having access to most essential health services, and more than 70% of health spending being met by people themselves.
Informal Jobs:
Most workers earn less than half of the minimum wage, 71% don’t have any written job contract while 54% do not get paid leave. Only around 10% of the workforce in India is formal.

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