2014-2016 impact: Illustration Social Security: India: NDWM's strategy to distribute pending social pensions

Kerala: campaign organized at Secretariat in the capital has resulted in the decision of Govt. to distribute the pending social pensions to the Domestic Workers. The campaign was a result of joint discussions of the domestic workers in the regional level meeting. The group has identified that the campaign as a strategy to fight for their rights.

Jharkhand: We have been working on the themes of Labour Rights and Social Protection in the past years through the WSM program. Both these themes are very relevant to our situation in India as a whole. During the last WSM program (pre-2014) we in Jharkhand first worked on the theme of labour rights and through different means and strategies got the Department of Labour to fix the wages for domestic workers. This was a success. Then we took up the issue of social protection. For almost two years along with our leaders we met the concerned Ministers and Government officials a number of times and requested them to implement the Social Security Act, but all in vain. Then in the end of 2012 we filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the High Court of Jharkhand requesting the Court to intervene in this matter.

The year 2014 is special for us as the High Court gave a positive verdict on our behalf and gave clear directions to the Government to take steps implement the Act. This implies that the Government has no choice but to implement the Act in its true sense. For NDWM it is an achievement, because, the State was very cool about the social protection issues and now is forced to act, otherwise the petitioner, that is, NDWM can file a contempt of Court petition in the same court.
This implies that more than 90% of the total workforce in Jharkhand State including domestic workers will now not be turned down but be enrolled into welfare Boards and be able to avail the existing schemes on social protection. We will be closely monitoring the activities of the Government in this regard so that we can bring to the notice of the court if any negligence is shown by the Government.

Thus the target before us for 2015 and the years to come is to ensure that social protection becomes a reality, that aged workers can live in dignity, health is ensured, education of the children is guaranteed, dignified housing and other benefits are made available to the informal workers.