Over 8.4 Crore Unorganized Workers Registered with Agriculture Being the Main Occupation on e-Shram Portal

The number of Unorganised Sector workers registration at the e-Shram portal has been rising steadily over the 12 weeks since its launch (as can be seen from the Figure below). As on 20th November 2021, which is more than 12 weeks since registration started, around 8,43,89,193 total number of unorganized workers have registered at the e-Shram portal, with an increase of 13,10,758 total workers registered the previous day.

It is pertinent to observe that the huge success in registration in e-Shram portal is due to unified command and control and regular directions and meticulous monitoring by Shri Bhupender Yadav, Union Minister for Labour & Employment, Environment, Forest & Climate Change with the spirited co-operation of all the senior officers in the Ministry and the state governments along with the massive involvement of central trade union leaders and their state counterparts.

Union Minister Shri Bhupender Yadav, Shri Rameshwar Teli, Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Shri Sunil Barthwal, Secretary, Labour & Employment have been extensively mobilizing resources, organizing series of the awareness program and also special camp with concerted efforts of the Chief Labour Commissioner (Central), Shri D.P.S. Negi and his team of committed officers in various regions of the country by involving employers, trade union leaders, employees, state government and NGOs have helped in a big way. So far more than 60 mega camps have been organized.

Week-wise data on the increase in number of registrations at the e-Shram portal over the previous 12 weeks since registration started on 24^th August, recorded maximum increase of such registrations for the 10^th week (2^nd-8^th November) - 1,15,66,985 registrations, followed by the 7^th week (12^th -18^th October) - 86,83,881 registrations. As of now, in the past four days, i.e. from 17^th to 20^th November 2021, around 57,24,286 registrations have been recorded at the e-Shram portal (figure below).

Registration at the e-Shram portal through CSC, Self or State Seva Kendras

The registrations of unorganised workers in the e-Shram portal can be through Common Service Centres (CSC), Self, or through State Seva Kendras. Maximum share of registrations is recorded for those registering through CSCs, followed by Self mode of registrations and minor share for State Seva Kendras. The number of CSC registrations at the e-Shram portal has been rising over the subsequent weeks to till date on 20^th November with 6,77,14,523 registrations (figure below).

In the previous six weeks since 5^th October 2021 onwards, a spike in registration of unorganised sector workers through State Seva Kendras has been recorded, with the largest such increase occurring in the preceding week (9th to 16^th November 2021) and it almost doubling from 24,842 to 53,970 registrations. As on 20^th November, the number of such registrations stands at 86,067.

The increase in registration of unorganised sector workers through CSC or Self mode of registrations particularly increased in India since 16th September onwards, and presently daily registrations of at least around 11 lakh are recorded through CSC registrations, around 2 lakh for Self-registration and almost 7 thousand for State Seva Kendras registrations, as of 20 ^th November 2021.

Out of total registrations, CSCs account for at least 60 % of such registrations and in the subsequent weeks its share has been increasing to around 80% presently as can be seen from the figure below.

State-wise trend in registration of unorganised sector workers at the e-Shram portal

Over the past 12 weeks, the states of West Bengal, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have the highest average growth rates of more than 15% regarding the registration of workers at the e-Shram portal.

In the 12^th week (9^th to 16^th November 2021) registrations at the e-Shram portal were particularly high for the states of Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal and moderately high in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Punjab, Odisha and Bihar (figure below).

Occupation-wise trend in registration of unorganised sector workers at the e-Shram portal

With respect to total number of workers registered across occupational categories at the portal over 12 weeks from 24^th August to 16^th November 2021, the top five categories are Agriculture, Construction, Apparel, Automobile and Transportation and Household and Domestic Workers. The ranking of these occupational categories in terms of total number of registration has varied over time. Additionally, since the last month, Capital Goods and Manufacturing has ranked as the fifth most important occupational category (table below).

As of 20^th November 2021, the top five occupational categories for workers registered in this portal are for Agriculture (53.2% and 4,48,76,425 registrations), Construction (12.1% and 1,02,58,713 registrations), Domestic and Household Workers (8.8% and 74,22,236 registrations), Apparel (6.3% and 52,89,110 registrations) and Capital Goods and Manufacturing (3.3% and 27,60,050 registrations). Agriculture is the main occupation for more than half of all registered workers, further two important sub-categories of Agriculture workers are ’Crop Farm Labourers’ and ‘Field Crop and Vegetable growers’ (with nearly 20 lakhs registrations on 20^th November 2021).

The top five occupational categories of women unorganised sector workers registered on the portal are Agriculture (2.1 crores), Domestic and Household workers (71 lakhs), Apparel (46 lakhs), Construction (23 lakhs) and Miscellaneous (17.98 lakhs). Correspondingly, the top five occupational categories for male workers are Agriculture (2.3 crores), Construction (78 lakhs), Automobile & Transportation (22.1 lakhs), Capital Goods and Manufacturing (18.9 lakhs) and Miscellaneous (7.7 lakhs).

Table showing major Occupational Groups of registered unorganised sector workers at the e-Shram portal over the previous 12 weeks (24^th August – 16^th November 2021)

Distribution of unorganised sector workers registered at the e-Shram portal by age-groups, income groups and financial inclusion

Age-group wise composition of unorganised sector workers registered at the portal in the last 12 weeks shows that the workers in the age group of ‘18-40’ have the highest share, followed by those in the age-group ‘40-50’ (figure below). Average weekly share of registrations across different age groups is highest for workers in the age-group of ’18-40’ followed by those in the age-group of ‘40-50’ (63 and 21 percentages respectively).

With respect to total number of registrations since the launch of the portal, the number of registrations for the workers in the age-group of ’18-40’ has increased from about 5 lakhs in the first week of the launch of the portal to about 4.8 crores in the 12^th week (10^th-16^th November).

On 20^th November 2021, the total number of registrations has reached 5 crore (5,17,42,315) in the age-group of ’18-40’ and 1.8 crore (1,88,18,074) in the age-group of ’40-50’.

Gender-wise analysis of e-Shram portal registrations indicates that during the first six weeks after the launch of the portal, among the workers getting registered, the share of male workers was slightly higher (more than 51%). However, in the last six weeks the share of females workers has become  higher as compared to the male workers (figure below). Thus, a shift is being observed in more female workers as compared to the male workers getting registered on the portal. By 20^th November, out of the total registrations, 48.2% (4,06,86,429) were male workers and 51.8 % (4,37,00,713) female workers.

In the first week of registration, of the total workers getting registered, around 5 lakhs were males and about 2.7 lakh were females. This has increased to 3.8 crore registrations for males and 4.05 crore registrations for females in the 12^th week (10^th -16^th November).

The registration for the ‘Others’ in terms of gender, at the e-Shram portal has been slow, with around 2,095 total registrations completed by 20^th November.

While registering at the e-Shram portal, the unorganised sector workers can furnish details of their bank accounts along with nominee details, to get benefits from government schemes linked with the registration on the portal, such as accident covers in case of death or disability or partial disbaility. Having details of both bank account and nominee details is an important aspect of this scheme and its integration with labour and other social welfare schemes formulated by the government.

Initially, a lower share of workers getting registered at the portal were providing details of their bank accounts. However, this share has gone substantially up, from 47% in the first week to 86.3% in the 12^th week (figure below). Additionally, nominee details of the workers getting registered at the portal were provided by only 38% of workers in the first week and 88% in the 12^th week.

Income-group wise analysis of workers registering at the portal shows that on an average 91% of the total workers registered are in the monthly income slab of less than Rs. 10000. The share of workers in the monthly income slab of Rs. 21000 and above is just 0.61%. The proportion of workers from the income slab of Rs 10000 has increased from 86% in the first week to about 92% in the 12^th week.