Context

The article discusses the challenges faced by the informal women workers in India and measures to address those challenges.

International Women’s Day

  • International Women’s Day is celebrated on March 8, all over the world. The day commemorates the achievements of women and their existence in general. 
  • The theme for International Women’s Day 2022 is ‘gender equality today for a sustainable tomorrow’.
  • The United Nations looks forward to highlighting the contribution of women and girls around the world who are volunteering in promoting their communities or working on climate change adaptation, mitigation, and in general working in building a more sustainable future for everyone.

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Gender Equality and Informal Female Workforce

  • India still has a long way to go to bring gender quality for India’s female informal workforce. A study by the International Labour Organization (ILO) 2018 concluded that in India, more than 95 percent of India’s working women are informal workers who work in labour-intensive, low-paying, highly precarious jobs/conditions, and with no social protection.
  • According to a bulletin published by the World Health Organization (WHO), “women’s informal work is central to the feminization of poverty”. 
    • However, we do not know much about the impacts of informal work on maternal, neonatal, and child health with the lack of childcare solutions being a serious concern.

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Benefits provided to the female workforce

  • India is very forward than other developed countries in terms of maternal health benefits and India’s statutory maternity leave stands at rank three among the global rankings. Following are the benefits provided:
    • Paid maternity leave of 26 weeks.
    • An option to work from home after 26 weeks of maternity leave on mutual agreement with the employer.
    • Mandatory creche facility for any establishment employing 50 or more than 50 women employees.

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Challenges

  • The above-mentioned benefits are mostly availed by the formal female workforce that constitutes less than 5 percent of the total female workforce. 
  • According to a study by ILO in 2016 lack of adequate childcare services leads to:
    • Women leaving the workforce
    • Earnings coming to an end
    • Discriminatory employment practices
    • Significant economic and health risks
  • These challenges have not been addressed adequately in India and it affects the informal women workers to a great extent.

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Measures to overcome the challenges

Following measures can be taken to enable women to get involved in more productive paid work and improve their maternal and childcare health:

Expansion of ICDS

  • The Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) is a government organization in India that serves food, pre-school, primary education and healthcare, health check-up, immunization, and referral facilities for children under the age of 6 as well as their mothers. 
  • The plan was established in 1975, withdrawn in 1978 by the Morarji Desai govt, and then restarted by the Tenth Five-Year Plan. The scheme is also applicable for lactating women and pregnant women.
  • Following are the primary objectives of the Anganwadi centres under the ICDS:
    • To provide maternal and child nutritional security,
    • To provide a clean and safe environment,
    • To provide early childhood education hence, enabling the women to re-join the work after childbirth.
  • There are certain limitations also that are discussed below:
    • It does not accommodate children below the age of three.
    • It functions only for a few hours a day which makes it difficult for working women to pick up children during working hours.
  • Measures to address these issues:
    • Early intake of children: If children under the age of 3 will also be catered by the Aanganwadi centres, then it will provide the following benefits:
      • Enable women to give time to paid work, and
      • Will serve the objective of the New Education Policy of providing quality early childhood education to the children in the 0-6 age groups.
      • Adress the issue of time constraints for working women.
  • However, expansion of these services will require the expansion of care worker infrastructure particularly the Anganwadi workers and helpers who are already underpaid and overworked.

Revitalize the Creche Scheme

  • There are certain provisions for working women under the National Creche Scheme but it does not get adequate government funding. There is a need for an inclusive approach to overcome the implementation gaps and to diversify the worksite and working hours. Following measures will help in addressing the issues:
  • Public Creches:
    • Public creches can be operated near the worksites such as markets, industrial areas, etc. This will enable timely breastfeeding, and handling any kind of emergency.
    • The Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) has tested this model in some cities.
  • The funds collected from the construction cess can be used for running the creches at construction sites.

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Some other measures

Benefits under PMMVY

  • No maternal benefits were provided to the informal women workers until the introduction of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) that mandate a cash transfer of Rs. 6,000 to pregnant and lactating mothers.
  • However, the notified scheme for this purpose namely the Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana has certain limits such as:
    • Benefits will be provided only for the first birth, and 
    • The amount has been reduced to Rs. 5,000.
  • States such as Tamil Nadu (Dr. Muthulakshmi Maternity Benefit Scheme), Rajasthan (Indira Gandhi Maternity Nutrition Scheme), Odisha (Mamta Scheme), Gujarat (Kasturba Poshan Sahay Yojana), and Chhattisgarh (Kaushalya Maternity Scheme) focus on reducing the gaps and providing additional benefits. 
  • Tamil Nadu offers Rs. 18,000 in cash and kind for two live births.
  • The cash transfer under PMMVY is not sufficient in terms of both the NFSA benchmark and nutritional needs and wage compensation.
  • Universal and unconditional maternity entitlements of at least six months of the minimum wages for pregnant women and lactating mothers must be implemented.

Compensation

  • The compensation is lower than the minimum wages and it is not sufficient to postpone the mother’s return to work for the first six months. 
  • The amount is also not equal to the NFSA inflation-adjusted benchmark.

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Way Forward

  • Lack of access to affordable and quality child healthcare services and maternity benefits put a great burden on the informal women workforce that increases the gender and class inequalities. 
  • Appropriate measures should be taken and the idea of affordable and quality child care infrastructure as an employment linked benefit and as a public good should be considered.

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