-Scroll.in The country must rethink its strategy of epidemic management to be more inclusive of the marginalised sections of the society. How do you discuss self quarantine with a person sharing a tiny shanty with 10 people in a slum? How do you advise social distancing to a manual scavenger? How do you tell an Adivasi, who struggles for one meal a day, to prioritise hand sanitisers? How do you educate tuberculosis...
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‘What will we eat?’ labourers and people from unorganised sectors stare at uncertain future -Deep Mukherjee
-The Indian Express As a result of the lockdown, thousands, including daily wage labourers, street vendors and those in the unorganised sector, are staring at a massive crisis, with many without the means to even buy food. Jaipur: It’s been an unusual Monday afternoon for Dharmanath Sapera, who, instead of his usual routine of collecting scrap or working at construction sites, is spending the day worrying about arranging the next day’s meal...
More »Congress president Sonia Gandhi bats for construction industry workers in letter to PM Modi
-The Hindu I request you to consider advising the State Building and Other Construction Workers Welfare Boards to roll out emergency welfare measures, particularly wage support, to construction workers who are in distress, she says Congress president Sonia Gandhi has asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to roll out emergency welfare measures for construction industry workers because of the ongoing COVID-19 lockdown, the party said on Tuesday. In her letter, dated March 23, Ms....
More »Unorganised workers have been hit hard, need direct payments, India Inc tells PM Modi -P Vaidyanathan Iyer
-The Indian Express Over the last few weeks, many daily wage labourers and part of the unorganised or informal sector could not find work because of the lockdown. AT LEAST six top corporate leaders are said to have recommended to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that the government should make payments to unorganised sector workers since they bear the brunt of the severe lockdown measures to arrest the spread of Covid-19 disease. N Chandrasekaran,...
More »The age of the neoliberal virus -Tabish Khair
-The Hindu In their response to the pandemic, countries have hardly evinced concern about the health and well-being of workers The coronavirus that causes the COVID-19 disease is the first neoliberal virus in the world. To say so is not to reduce its dangers — particularly to the already vulnerable, such as the old, the ill or the poor (who cannot isolate without starving) — but to criticise how it has been...
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