ECONOMIC TRENDS

WAGE TRENDS

Wage Trends.— The poverty of the landless labourers, as a part of the poverty of the people of India, is all too known. There is further a painful socio-economic contrast between a small section of population having fabulous earnings and a larger section living on the brink of economic misery. Rich mine owners, landlords and high salaried officials who absorb a sizeable portion of the district income, co-exist with innumerable destitute families and countless paupers.

Apart from the low level of earnings, there are a number of factors which affect the real wages and standard of living of the workers. One of the evils suffered by the working class in connection with employment is the undesirable method of recruitment of labour through contractors which is associated with many abuses and malpractices [S. A. Palekar, Real Wages in India.]. This is quite characteristic of the mine workers in Bhandara district. Ignorance and illiteracy among the workers helps the contractor in pushing down wages to the lowest level. Another factor which leads to the exploitation of labour is the casual nature of employment and its insecurity. This is characteristic of the numerous landless labourers, bidi workers as well as mine workers in the district. The mine workers in particular and the factory workers in general suffer from another handicap that they are required to work under unhealthy conditions which affect their productivity and span of working life.

In the bidi-making industry, which is by far the most important industry in Bhandara district, the piece-rated workers are deprived of the contracted wage by supplying defective or inadequate raw material.

These and a number of other evils which are characteristic of an unorganised labour force have been in existence since the past. Against this background the wage trends in the district are given below. The earliest information about wages which is furnished in the Bhandara District Gazetteer of 1908 is given below.

Farm-Servants : "Farm-servants are generally engaged by the year and are known as chakar or nagaria. Up till recently they were always paid in grain, but in the vicinity of Bhandara cash wages are often now substituted, and the rate has risen to five or six rupees a month. During the last year or two there has been an acute demand for labour as the population was largely depleted by emigration during the scarcity season of 1903. Many of the labouring classes went to Berar, where good wages were obtainable and have not returned. At the same time the construction of the new railway and the opening of the manganese mines have created an extra demand and raised the level of wages. As a consequence farm-servants and labourers are in a very advantageous position. Sometimes they stipulate that their employer shall sell them rice at a seer per rupee cheaper than the market rate. And if they work after sundown they expect to get the evening meal. This state of things is, however, mainly confined to the Chandpur tract in which the mines are situated, and elsewhere labour is still obtainable at a moderate wage. In the Bhandara tahsil grain wages are stated to be 8 small kuros or 120 lbs. a month of unhusked rice and Rs. 4 as an annual present, known as jiwan. Besides this, the farm-servant gets a bhara or headload of rice-stalks at harvest containing from 15 to 30 lbs. of. grain, and a khara containing from 30 to 40 lbs. when the grain is carried home after threshing. The farm-servant also receives a pair of shoes and a blanket every year, and is allowed to take the gleanings of rice fields and the sweepings of the threshing-floor. He also gets food at three or four festivals and similar presents at the harvest of wheat and juar if his employer grows the crops. All this works out to little more than Rs. 3 a month. Another wage is 10 small khandis or about 2,500 lbs. of unhusked rice a year and four rupees. Taking unhusked rice at 60 lbs. to the rupee this works out to Rs. 46 a year or a little under four rupees a month. The farm-servant's wife is often bound to work for his employer when required. She gets ordinary wages and also an annual retaining fee of a cartload of wood, eight annas worth each of salt and chillies and 200 bundles of grass for thatching her house. In return for this she may not work for anyone else when her husband's master requires her services. Grain wages are said to have increased by about 20 per cent in the last ten years. Occasionally the proprietor sows about half an acre of land for the wives of his farm-servants, who cut the crop and divide the produce between them. A head farm-servant is called awari and is paid a little more than the others.

Labourers: At the last settlement [Settlement Report, Para 19.] (1894—96) Mr. Napier recorded the rates of wages as follows: ' Two annas a day is the maximum daily wage of a casual labourer, while in many cases a woman works 16 days and a man 12 days for a rupee and one meal of rice in the day.' Since this period there has been a marked rise in the rate of wages. When labour is scarce, as at the time of transplantation of rice, a woman may be paid 2 to 3 annas and a man 3 to 4 annas a day. For weeding the crops for a day of six or seven hours a woman gets 6 pice in Sakoli. At harvesting a woman is paid 2 lbs. of juar or wheat or 4 lbs. of unhusked rice, and a man gets twice as much. The condition of the labouring classes has improved and they can now afford a good meal of rice, whereas formerly they often had nothing better than ambil or a paste made of a small quantity of rice boiled in a panful of water. They have regular loin-cloths reaching to the knee instead of merely short peices of cloth covering the thighs. Labourers on the railway can also afford bandis or cotton coats and caps.

Village Servants : A village menial is called Aikari and the village servants are known collectively as Aiaikari. The Lohar and Barhai, or blacksmith and carpenter, are each paid 6 small kuros or 90 lbs. of unhusked rice annually for repairing the iron and wooden implements of agriculture. Sometimes the rate is a little higher and they also receive presents of a few pounds more at sowing and harvest time. For making the share of a new plough or bakhar the blacksmith is paid 15 lbs. of grain for his labour,   the iron also being supplied; for a new yoke 7½ lbs. are paid. The washerman and barber are now often paid according to services rendered. If they receive an annual due, it is 75 to 90 lbs. of unhusked rice, or the barber may be paid 16 lbs. for each adult male in the family [Bhandara District Gazetteer, 1908, pp. 112 to 114.]."

After the publication of the old Bhandara Gazetteer, the level of wages changed with that of prices. The rising prices during the World War I pushed up wage rates of almost all categories of workers. The agricultural workers were benefited by the rising wages, while the fixed income earners suffered due to rising prices. The depression of 1930 pushed down the earnings of daily wage earners, while the fixed income earners were the beneficiaries as their incomes did not fall commensurately with prices. Industrial work and agricultural labourers had to suffer miserably on account of unemployment and depressed wage rates.

The Index numbers of working class cost of living at Nagpur and the then Madhya Pradesh State, which are given below are important in the context of the study of wage trends in Bhandara district [Bhandara district is adjacent to Nagpur and the cost of living in the district might be considered to accord slightly on the lower side with that in Nagpur].

COST OF LIVING.

INDEX NUMBERS.

[Base year 1939—100 (Real Wages in India, S. A. Palekar.)]

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