The endless lines for trains and buses. The tireless walks back home. The pictures of migrant workers with desperation writ large on their face have given chance to the opposition to attack the government.
Rahul Gandhi spent some time with the migrants to make the point that the BJP was running a government, which cared only for the rich. The opposition has almost unitedly condemned the government for being callous and not bothering to see the writing on the wall.
It’s a fact which the Centre cannot deny that it has been lacking in doing enough for the migrants. And hence, it is working on a plan now to do some damage control. News18.com has accessed a blueprint of the government scheme for the long-term rehabilitation of these migrant workers.
The prime minister could unveil an app for these migrants. The app would sync the details of the migrant workers to the labour ministry and would have details of their qualifications and job specialisations. "The entire idea is to ensure that the workers get the jobs as per their skills and are not under-utilised and under paid," a government official said.
Tabulation of the workers isn’t an easy task as most workers are in the unorganised sector and this is where the role of the states come in. The Centre through labour ministry and home ministry is in touch with the state governments, asking them to give data and do a survey of the workers.
The data so collected will be fed to the main central system and will be used for also giving out the social benefits which are announced by the government.
"It’s going to be somewhat like the ones we have for women under the Jan Dhan Yojana. Not just this, if at some point the workers want to go independent and begin skilled independent outlets then this app could be their ticket to central help routed through state government," the official said.
The government hopes this would ensure that the workers have a reason to come back. The Supreme Court has asked states and Centre to ensure that there are facilities for the workers to return back to their place of work. But not many may be confident to come back as job security is no guarantee.
From the point of view of corporate and medium and small sectors — that have now resumed work — shortage of labour is the main issue. With most labour gone back home, it would be required a lot of convincing for the government and the owners to bring these labourers back. The Centre hopes this app and blueprint would do the trick. But more importantly it would blunt the criticism it’s facing over the migrant issue.
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