Chandigarh, August 10
Labour crisis in Punjab has deepened. Earlier only agriculture sector was hit by it. Now industrial sector has also started feeling its heat. Sources say due to the scarcity of casual and skilled labour, the production cost of the industry has started going up.
State’s industrial capital Ludhiana is among the worst hit. Hosiery industry has not got enough labour this time. “We have labour working on contract. We used to pay the labour on piece-rate basis. However, this time many people with skill to prepare woollen cloth have not turned up,” says Sunil Dutt, owner of a woollen unit in Ludhiana.
Dutt says on the one hand, the woollen industry faced the problem of labour, on the other the price of dyed yarn had gone up by 100 per cent, adding to the cost.
Earlier, for transplanting paddy, farmers in Punjab faced an acute shortage of migrant labour. Paddy transplantation cost went up from Rs 650 per acre to Rs 1,200 per acre in certain parts of the state. The labour crisis has made agricultural scientists to work on paddy transplanters.
One reason for the scarcity of the labour, some industrialists say was perhaps the non-revision of minimum wage by the state government. Neighbouring states have better minimum wages for the labour compared to Punjab. Due to this, labour may be preferring neighbouring states to Punjab.
Another reason is said to be the implementation of the National Rural Employement Guarantee scheme in the country. Earlier labour used to come from Bihar, some parts of Uttar Pradesh, Bengal, Orissa etc. But now as the employment guarantee scheme has been enforced in the entire country, casual labour that worked on a daily-wage basis has stopped
moving from these states to Punjab, say industrialists.
Venod Thapar, pesident, Knitwear Industry, says skilled labour was the backbone of Ludhiana hosiery. “Its shortage is real and is affecting the industry,” he adds.
However, labour shortage in not confined to Ludhiana only. The entire state is affected by it. Subash Arora, president, Chandigarh Plywood Dealers Association, says the labour rate has gone up by Rs 1,000 per month in a few weeks because of the scarcity of labour. If earlier a labourer was available for Rs 2,000, now he is not even available for Rs 3,000 for 25 working days in
a month.
The plywood industry is also facing the problem of raw material and labour. As farmers have stopped growing poplar, basic raw material for manufacturing plywood, its cost has gone up rapidly. Shortage of labour has further added to the manufacturing cost, he says.
