20 The place of agrarian labour I
Salamah Ansari
INTRODUCTION
Agrarian labour is an important but vulnerable segment of the rural Indian economy. As a matter of fact, agrarian labourers are involved in actual cultivation of land in different capacities. They could be tenants having tenure of different sorts. They could be simply landless or own patches of land. They could be share-croppers. What distinguishes them is their contribution of labour power to everyday agricultural operations whatever be their relationship with land. In general, they earn their daily bread with the aid of poorly-paid, unskilled, intermittent work which, due to the considerable physical effort involved, is considered of low standing (Breman, 1976: 1905). Approximately, 27% to 30% of the working class is agrarian labourer. This category does not include cultivators and farmers.
Agrarian labour is a heterogeneous social category and not exclusively an economic class depending on wages alone. Most of them work in the informal sector. But then, the informal sector cannot be demarcated as a separate economic compartment and/or labour situation (Breman, 1976: 1905). Certain proportion of agrarian labour work for wages, but they also work on family farms. Some are labourers but not for the entire year. Some may work in the non-agricultural occupations for a part of the year during lean agricultural season. And then, there are some who work as labourers because their own land is too small and cultivating it does not suffice their needs. Traditionally, agricultural labourers have been in the employment of the bigger land-owners. This was not a simple employment set up but one that extended beyond mere economic relationship. There used to be firm and intimate bonds between the households of landlords and their labourers which often continued from generation to generation (Breman, 1974: 490). In sociological literature, this sort of relationship has been designated as patron-client relationships. But, with the passage of time, the bonds of patronage have disappeared. As a result, the agrarian labourers face greater degree of economic insecurities and vulnerabilities now than in the past. At the same time, they enjoy greater degree of freedom as well as they are not bound any longer to work for their village masters. They can migrate to other places for work and livelihood if they so desire.
Besides being landless, agrarian labour usually lack any other form of economic assets. In case such landless labourers needed money, they would not have anything besides their own labour to mortgage. Marriage, sickness, drought, deathand certain other economic contingencies coerce these labourers to enter into a vicious cycle of perpetual indebtedness. Not only the labourer but his entire family would get entrapped into this dependency relation which was neither equal nor mutual. Consequently,forms of bonded labour situation arise; the bonded labourer work on the land, his wife and children help with domestic chores and look after the cattle (Jodhka, 2007: 3926).
Landless labourers are often involved in small cottage industries and supplementary industries like dairy, weaving, collection offuel wood etc. There are certain common lands in every village where cattle can graze and the local populace extracts their utility requirements from there. Like grass for cattle feeding, bamboo for building huts and animal sheds, basket making etc. Privatization of common property resources like grasslands has been extensive in rural India. This excludes a majority section of landless villagers from any access to land and its resources.
In India, as you know, ownership of land is a reflection and measure of power. Landowners always were at an advantaged position vis-à-vis the landless labourers. Big landowners did hire labourers because they needed labour for cultivating their large tracts of land. Other major reason for this relationship was that the servile labour added to the status and power of the land-owner and allowed him a life of leisure and visible privilege (Jodhka, 2007: 3927). Perpetuation of such relationship between the landless and the landed gave rise to a form of bonded labour in a semi-feudal agrarian economy (Shah, 2013: 29).
Sure enough, the rural agrarian structure arising from such exploitative relations marginalized the landless. However, the relationship between the landowner and his labourers was not casual. The labourer was given the bare minimum to survive, but his survival was one of the duties of the landowner. Even if the landowners did not care for the overall wellbeing of the labourers, they were definitely interested in the reproduction of labour. Some people feel that there was a certain amount of loyalty, trust and faith that informed the mutuality of this type of relationship. This is not to say that the existing agrarian structure was egalitarian.
However, with the advent of industrialization the ties between the landowner and the labourer started weakening. Social intercourse with labourers got reduced to an absolute minimum (Breman, 1974: 490). Agrarian labourers started getting employed on contractual basis, a type of casualness and informality seeped into the commitment based relationship between the landowner and the labourer. Labourers became more mobile and their female counterparts got lesser opportunities to work as agricultural help. Instead, they were forced to take up unskilled jobs.
As agrarian labourwork in the informal sector, they are mostly denied the basic social securities which are available to the workers in formal and organised sectors. The agrarian labour faces general neglect and occupies bottom rungs in the Indian rural-agrarian structure. Their lack of skill and training leads to limited alternative employment opportunities for them (Padhi, 2007: 23). Seasonal unemployment is the lot of agrarian labour. In this module, we shall consider only landless agricultural labourers and not small cultivators with negligible land holdings. We shall delve deeper into the social and economic existence of this footloose labour in the changing Indian agrarian-rural structure. We will also briefly discuss the inter linkages between technology, caste, gender, land, and labour. In the process, we will bring to your attention the uneven agrarian transformation of Indian economy. Then, we shall look at the role played by caste and religion in shaping the life and livelihood of the footloose labour. In the subsequent part, we shall look at the gender implications of the casualization of labour.
AGRARIAN STRUCTURE
Rural agrarian economy in India is characterized by irregular employment, under employment and low wages. These incidences of distorted employment are pronounced as there is surplus labour in the economy. Jonathan Parry in his book- The Worlds of Indian Industrial Labour posits that the particular trajectory of industrial development in India is responsible for the worsening condition of the agrarian labour (Kumar, 2000: 898). Presence of unskilled surplus labour is a problem for most economies which are transforming from an agrarian economy to an industrial economy. The condition is worsened in India as the transformation is not smooth. Ideally the transformation should be coupled with a substantial migration of labour from agriculture to industry. Industrial sector should be capable of accommodating surplus labour from agriculture.
The Indian agrarian structure and the varied roles played by labour in it is a quite distinct from other developed countries. Whilst the developed countries were developing, there was considerable amount of class consciousness among the labour. Indian labour lacks this class consciousness of the western type. Instead, linkages of caste and kinship drive the organization of agrarian labour. The study of agrarian labour needs to take into account themes like kinship and religion as these have a bearing on how labour sees and organizes itself in the contemporary economy (Kumar, 2000: 898). Social stratification on the lines of caste and religion plays a vital role in deciding the life and livelihood conditions of agrarian labour. Jodhka stresses the need to give due consideration to ‘the different ways in which people themselves represented their hierarchies’ while analysing systems of socio- economic stratification (Jodhka, 2000: 3020).
Long-term commitment is a prominent feature of Indian social structure. It transcends beyond the divisions of rural-urban and/or the formal-informal. It has been proven empirically that those migrant workers who managed to get employment in industries continued with their jobs. Their wages were higher than in agriculture and that is why they seldom left their jobs (Bhowmik, 2009:139). They have a feeling of lifetime commitment towards industrial job also. They try to replicate their rural attitudes and social relations in urban settings as well. Bhowmik contends that labour in developing countries had strong attachment to agriculture and was embedded in social institutions that were particularistic rather than universalistic (Bhowmik, 2009: 135).
Modernisation theorists believed that Indian agrarian society would follow the development trajectory of the West. But, that was not to be. Feudalism and capitalism of the West are different from India. Thus, the Western conceptual models for understanding agrarian labour cannot be applied to India lock, stock and barrel. For instance, there is thickening nexus between caste structure and agrarian relationships in India (Joshi, 2002: 480). This should be accounted for while adopting any imported conceptual model.
We all know that land is the most pivotal part of agrarian life and economy. Yet, there has always been a great hiatus between the images of agrarian social structure in the minds of different sections of political elite on the one hand and the actual conditions of agrarian society on the other (Joshi, 2002: 479). It would be wrong to assume that the doors of migration to industrial sector are automatically open to the agrarian labour. Industrialization does provide an opportunity to qualified and competent individuals to acquire a job irrespective of their caste. Regardless of this, a correlation exists between the status of an agrarian labourer in rural economy and urban economy. It has been proven empirically that landed peasants and other large farmers benefit more from urbanization. They are the first ones to migrate and buy land in urban sectors. This land again adds to their social status. But when the landless labours migrate, they migrate to the squalor of industrialization. Bhowmik conjectures that the largest chunk of the urban informal sector (two-thirds) is self- employed. This includes domestic workers each of whom may have several employers; home-based workers, whose main employer may not be known as they operate through contractors and subcontractors; and street vendors who may not have any employer (Bhowmik, 2013: 29).
The role of State is of considerable importance in the Indian context. After Independence, the state was a major player in the building of the nation-state. The economic planners and policy makers were quite concerned about the place of the agrarian labour in the new economy. They primarily looked at the agrarian labour as the most marginalized section of society which is characteristically landless and works as agricultural labour in other’s farms. The Planning Commission deliberated on securing full employment and proper living conditions for the rural communities especially the agrarian labour. As a welfare state, the post-independent India witnessed a surge in welfare policies and programmes under the broad rubric of rural development which aimed at changing the social structure of the village in its entirety (Thakur, 2007: 230).Admittedly, some of these programmes were directly meant for the welfare and uplift of the agrarian labour.
So far, we have often talked of agrarian labour in gender-neutral terms. Now we know that it is the women workers who are the more marginalized sections of this already relegated section of the agrarian hierarchy. It is time we devoted adequate attention to the female agrarian labour and their place in the rural-agrarian structure. The processes of agrarian change have also brought about changes in the life and livelihood of the female labour. Traditionally, only men migrated but the changing circumstances have forced the females also to migrate and join the ranks of the reserve army of casual labour in urban and rural India.
To reiterate, land is a vital element of agrarian structure. Macro-level change processes like industrialization and urbanisation very often lead to dispossession of a huge section of farmers.However, big farmers often have alternate survival methods but the small and marginal farmers get crushed. Dispossession from land is not as simple as taking away an economic factor from people, a mere deprivation from livelihood and means of production. It is something more. It is disrupting life, lifestyle, relationships, and socio- cultural identity. For generations people have not known any other way of existing and being in the world. A considerable proportion of land belonging to farmers and tribals is not their own earning but their inherited property. For a majority of farmers and tribals, land is one of the most important assets and sometimes the only asset that they have (Sathe, 2011: 152). It is undisputed that there exists an emotional bonding between the farmer and the land. But more importantly, land is a source of employment and livelihood to the farmer, the land does not give him a high quality of life, but it helps him to eke out a living and somewhat makes him “food assured” (Sathe, 2011: 153). A farmer does not become jobless as long as he has some access to land. In difficult times, farmers can fall back upon land and it constitutes their security. Alienation from land means being thrown into new kinds of unknown uncertainties and risks. Thus, land is a representation of social, cultural, and economic identity and also a source of security financial and otherwise. If we go by this understanding of agrarian structure, we can adequately appreciate the precarious place of agrarian labour in the countryside. To be without land and with their labour power alone, agrarian labour is subject to multiple vulnerabilities.
GENDER COMPLEXITIES
As we have talked about, it was a characteristic of the traditional agrarian social structure that an agrarian labourer would serve his landowner along with his entire family. Female members also constituted the group of agrarian labour and performed menial jobs. This included serving as domestic help, maid servant, baby sitter and doing small odd jobs at the landowner’s house. Besides, the pull factor in the urban sector and the push factor for migration in rural economy is a major factor for women migration. As the demand for agricultural wage labour has not kept pace with the growing number of households dependent on this source of income (Breman, 2003: 4153), women are compelled to migrate along with the men of the family. As this agrarian structure weakened with the advent of industrialization and consequent in formalisation of labour, it was no longer imperative for the female labourers to work with employer farmers, and they too moved out of the farmer’s bondage. Once freed from the farmer’s homestead, the female labourers also migrate to industrial sector to work as unskilled workers. Post-migration, when they arrive at an industrial site, or in a town or city, they face dual handicaps: one of being unskilled and the other of being females. It is typical of most of the societies that female members are more vulnerable than their male counterparts. Invariably, female employment is inferior, and yields lower wages than their male counterparts. In cases that both practice the same trade, women are mostly at a disadvantage (Breman, 2003: 4154).Be it physical, social, sexual, financial or emotional need, female members are more prone to exploitation and violence. The agrarian structure too was more stringent towards their females than males. As Breman rightly notes (1995: 2294), unskilled labour is the most vulnerable social class in low- income countries, women even more so than men.
It is not the push factor of rural economy alone that is responsible for the migration of female labourers. Rural economy has an inherent bondage system existing in its social structure. But negating it is the pull of urban sector. People in villages have a fancy for urban jobs, among other things it is partly because of the idea of freedom that the urban area promises and partly because of the good experience of few fellow labourers. There is a preoccupation with industrial employment which has diverted attention not only from the large segment of the urban population that earns its living in informal sectors, but even more from the social relations of production in agriculture (Breman, 1999: 3).Lack of gainful employment, poverty, and discrimination etc. are major factors that push workers from rural areas into urban sectors. Failing to gain formal employment, they take up informal sector jobs. This step is often out of compulsion than choice. These labourers spend their meagre savings for migrating from villages to cities. Often it is indebted farmers or bankrupt workers who are forced to migrate. In such situations they have to take up any job that comes across in order to repay the debt. Maintaining the family back at home further keeps them involved in urban informal sectors. Working in urban informal sector becomes a vicious cycle for the agrarian labourers who migrate to cities in search of greener pastures. It can be concluded thus that workers move from one level of poverty (at their places of origin) to another level of poverty, at their place of destination (Bhowmik and More, 2001: 4827).
In the industrial sector, the mechanism of bonding the labour is similar to the agrarian structure. The poor female labourers try to attain some security, financial and otherwise by entering into dependency relationship with superiors. These superiors could be middle men, or people of their village or caste who have migrated earlier than them or anybody who can assure them work and wages. Being the weaker party there is willingness on their part to acknowledge infinite accommodation and gratitude, whether this has to be given material or immaterial expression (Breman, 1976: 1906).It is to be noted here that the relationship between the creditor cum employer and informal female footloose labour is not simple. Along with low wages, irregular employment, and stringent work conditions, the female footloose labour is also bound to supply labour to the employer as and when required. Many times, this involves displacement and relocation. The incidence of debt bondage is widespread in the informal sector economy, particularly among female migrant workers equipped with a social identity which makes them vulnerable to exploitation and discrimination from the better endowed castes and classes (Breman, 2010: 330).Construction is one of the major sectors where labourers are employed. As the construction site changes, the employer moves along with his herd of footloose labourers. These female informal labourers do not have a choice if they want to migrate or not. Migration becomes an obligation on their part. This migration does not affect only the male members, other members of a household or a wider circle of equals have to be mobilized (Breman, 1976: 1906).
To understand the exploitation and marginalization of female labourers, it is necessary to acknowledge the social and familial role they play. Being a woman, motherhood is forced upon them as their biological and natural obligation. Unskilled female labourers are typically illiterate and do not have access to family planning methods. Even if the provisions for same are available, their inhibitions do not allow them to access it. The prevalent norms of patriarchy inhibit them from talking about their body and physical needs. As new migrants, they hardly have requisite resources to access reproductive health care.
Back in the village, by experience and through kinship support, she would know certain things and may have access to the poor quality medical facilities available there. In villages accessing medical help becomes relatively easier as there is somebody to escort them when needed. However, in urban areas it is difficult for marginalized women to get help when they need it. It cannot be said with certainty that reproductive health of rural women is better in villages than in urban areas. What I am arguing is that in the rural social structure, this biological aspect of women is accepted and there are social mechanisms to help her sail through this challenging phase of life. A female rural labourer will not lose her job at the employer farmer’s house if she is pregnant. She would be taken care of as this would be a part of the social system. Post parturition, she can easily resume her duties. Pregnancy seldom becomes a reason for lay off in rural societies.
While working as urban informal labourer, females take many more leave than their male counterparts as they fulfil their reproductive roles. This is because of the extended maternity leave taken by them. This further pushes them into informal sectors which have less rigid hiring rules as compared to formal industrial sector. It has been argued that the steady expansion of the industrial sector brought a fall rather than a rise in the percentage of female factory workers (Breman, 1999: 23). As factories have formal and stringent hiring rules, women labourers find it difficult to gain employment and once hired to continue it. There is hardly any provision for maternity leaves when it comes to the hiring of unskilled or semi- skilled labourers. They are hired and fired as per need. No formal hiring contract includes maternity leaves for physical labourers in industries. As a consequence, there is a swelling in the proportion of females in the informal sector in urban areas.
There are several other reasons for the presence of female labourers in informal sectors than formal ones. Education and training is the primary reason. Female footloose labourers mostly lack the required skill for formal sector employment. Lack of education disqualifies them from getting regular formal employment and they are forced to accept informal jobs. Another reason which leads to exploitation of female labourers is their inherent nature to endure injustice. Socialized to be submissive in their parental house, they bring these values to their marital homes. It can be seen that it is often at this juncture that women face the largest proportion of exploitation. They are not spared from any form of violence be it physical, emotional or sexual. In villages, as a part of their socialization, women are trained to become more forgiving, less self-seeking, parsimonious, passive and submissive. Quietly following the orders of husband and in-laws is considered as a virtue in most of the households. Migration and subsequent employment in informal sector becomes doubly risky and exploitative for women. It may only add to the female labourers’ prior experience of violence and injustice. Often, female agrarian labourers try to bear the gross violence of their human rights to a considerable extent. Occasionally, they take recourse to protests. There is general belief that employers exploit women labourers more than their male counterparts.
As women are steadier and more frugal, as well as less egoistic, in dealing with the lower earnings, they have to make for longer hours of work disadvantage (Breman, 2003: 4154). This is in fact a division of labour on the lines of patriarchal convention, and not based on egalitarian gender principles. Women are socialized to play a certain role; it is not their natural self. But they grow up to believe it is natural for them to be in a particular way. Exposed to family- based employment system in the rural homes, they imitate the same role-play in cities. They are used to working as house maids and baby sitters, each of which requires them to submit to their land owner’s female family members.
The tradition to submit continues as they think submitting to employers is the normal behaviour expected of them. In many cases, the employers have used the widespread employment of women as a means of keeping wages depressed (Bhowmik and Sarkar, 1998: 50). Being a woman is like double jeopardy, they are condemned to perpetual mobility in the search for work both within and between sectors and between modes of employment (Breman, 2001: 4813). In India, the belief that a woman is less productive than man is quite widespread. It is not limited to the marginalized footloose labourers and informal sector workers alone. It is equally prevalent in the corporate world. There it is called as glass ceiling, that is, a level in institutional hierarchy beyond which women employees do not get promoted. It is unseen but at the same time unbreakable. The rationale for which is stated as the natural tendency of females to be emotional and lacking leadership skills. Irrespective of their qualifications and achievements, there is a glass ceiling for females in corporate institutions. So we can imagine the exclusion and demotion that the uneducated and meek female labourers might face in the informal sector.
Typically, the working conditions of informal sector are hazardous for the health of workers. When there is a larger representation of females in the informal labour force it has serious adverse effects on their health. As they perform their reproductive roles, the unhealthy environment also impacts the unborn and the neonate. This leads to a vicious cycle. Children borne out of unhealthy mothers face a higher risk of medical complications. The vulnerability faced by women of reproductive age is inherited by their children. These women coming from poor families do not get enough nutrition for maintaining healthy bodies. It is often the male members of family who eat first and the best food available. This was an ancient practice. Men were fed first and better as they were expected to work out in the fields whereas women did the lesser laborious household chores. But this has changed overtime. As more and more females are joining the workforce their nutritional requirements are similar to males. Nonetheless, there is no provision for accommodating these changing needs of female labourers. They continue to get less than the required amount of nutrition, partly because of poverty and partly because of the patriarchal Indian social structure.
It is relevant to discuss here the taboo that is associated with the use of any form of family planning methods in rural as well as urban neighborhoods. It is mostly women who are responsible to adopt family planning measures, men seldom worry about that. Pregnancy is mostly treated as the female’s responsibility. Whether to have a child or not is the man’s prerogative but the burden of using contraceptives is on females. Men usually do not share an equal responsibility in this important responsibility of family life. Female labourers do not have access to proper health care facilities. Even if there is provision of medical help, accessing it is a big hurdle for them. Multiple pregnancies further weaken the dwindling health of female labourers.
As informal labourers, women are mostly involved in jobs that are physically strenuous; the labourers get exhausted physically by the end of the day. Many labourers resort to drinking to soothe their aching bodies. Alcoholism is considerably prevalent in the labour class. Beating up wife after getting drunk and marital rapes are not so rare incidences in the lives of female labourers. Alcoholism is also associated with financial pauperization. Women are more frugal and save their money. Men on the other hand, if alcoholic, tend to spend a sizeable proportion of their earnings on drinks. As a result the female members are even more burdened to support the family financially. The earning male members of the family become more of a burden than resource in such situations.
Women often get trapped in the vicious trap of prostitution. This is not restricted to urban areas but is more prevalent in urban dwellings given the predominant male character of labour migration. Male workers often are unaccompanied by their wives. Male labourers who are young and coming of age also constitute a sizeable proportion of labourers. For these men, satisfying their sexual urge is just a need and they are not looking for long term commitment. It is women from the same socio-economic background who play this role. Such women can be local or migrant. But they find it easier to earn a livelihood by selling their bodies as other form of work employment is difficult to come by. Many women involved in the fresh trade have often been brought to cities under the pretext of providing employment but deceived and pushed into flesh trade. The situation of such women is far more vulnerable as they get employed for certain peak years of their lives and once they age they become unemployed. They are often pushed into dire poverty and in diseased conditions which further compound their misery.
In Brief
In this module, we have tried to give you a sense of the place of the agrarian labour in agrarian structure. You would have seen that much of their economic vulnerability and social insecurity emanates from their general condition of landlessness. We have accorded specific attention to the gender complexities of this category as we feel that we have had so far this tendency to look at the world of agrarian labour as a predominantly male world. Also, we have highlighted the incessant traffic between the rural and the urban in terms of labour migration. Most of those who eke out their livelihood in the interstices of the urban-industrial sprawl have their one foot firmly placed in the increasingly vulnerable rural world caused by agrarian distress and depleting livelihood opportunities. We will continue our discussion of the agrarian labour in the next module (4.3 B) where you will also find references and readings from which our understanding of the topic at hand is derived.
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