94.11 pc registered informal workers’ income at Rs 10,000 or below; 74pc belong to SC, ST, OBC

Over 94 per cent of 27.69 crore informal sector workers registered on the e-Shram portal have a monthly income of Rs 10,000 or below and over 74 per cent of the enrolled workforce belongs to scheduled castes (SC), scheduled tribes (SC) and other backward classes (OBC), according to the latest data. The proportion of informal workers getting a monthly income of Rs 10,000 or below was 92.37 per cent in the middle of November 2021 when total enrolments on e-Shram portal were a little over 8 crore.

Those belonging to SC, ST and OBC who enrolled on the portal were 72.58 per cent in the middle of November 2021.

The experts are of the view that as the enrolments progress on e-Shram portal towards the ultimate goal of enrolling all informal sector workers estimated at 38 crore in the country, the data would show sharp disparities in the society.

e-Shram portal is aimed at building a comprehensive National Database of Unorganized Workers (NDUW) in the country.

The aim of the portal is to boost the last-mile delivery of the welfare schemes for over 38 crore unorganised workers in the country. It was launched on August 26, 2021.

The experts are of the view that almost all targeted informal sector workers should be registered on e-Shram portal during this calendar year only, which would give a big opportunity to the political leadership to draft an evidence-based policy for the large section of deprived classes in the country.

According to the latest data, as many as 27.69 crore informal sector workers are registered on the portal and show that this unorganised workforce is living under extreme poverty and a majority of those belong to socially backward communities.

The data showed that 94.11 per cent of the registered informal workers have a monthly income of Rs 10,000 or below, while 4.36 per cent have a monthly income between Rs 10,001 and Rs 15,000.

The social category analysis of the data shows that 74.44 per cent of registered workers are below the socially backward classes, including 45.32 per cent OBC, 20.95 per cent SC and 8.17 per cent ST. The proportion of the General Category workers is 25.56 per cent.

Age-wise analysis of the data show that 61.72 per cent of the registered workers on the portal are of the age from 18 years to 40 years, while 22.12 per cent are of the age from 40 years to 50 years.

The proportion of the registered workers aged above 50 years is 13.23 per cent, while 2.93 per cent of workers are aged between 16 and 18 years.

Gender analysis shows that 52.81 per cent of registered workers are female and 47.19 per cent are male.

Top-5 states in terms of registrations are Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.

Occupation wise, agriculture is at the top with 52.11 per cent of enrolments done by those related to the farm sector followed by domestic and household workers at 9.93 per cent and constructions workers at 9.13 per cent.