Vol: 8, Issue: 4 2018

Page: 62-76

Unorganised Workforce in India: Growing Concerns and Shrinking Rights

Meena Kumary S

History reveals that labour has always been stratified; on the basis of caste during the Vedic age, on the basis of social security and entitlements in the neo-liberal globalized age- as formal and informal / unorganized. This neo stratification of labour as informal not only poses challenges to the economy but also to the society and polity as large number of populaces remain as political citizens yet devoid of social citizenship in terms of social security and protection . It also poses a Constitutional challenge as the livelihood and survival of more than 90% of the “We” who made the constitution now rest in the hands of non-state entities against whom the protective shield of fundamental rights does not hold. It is in this context that the present article estimates the stock of unorganized workforce in India so as to formulate strategy for their legal and Constitutional inclusion.