Manish Sabharwal, Chairperson and Co-founder of Teamlease argues that in order to compete in a global economy, India needs greater productivity and formal employment. Renana Jhabvala, best known for her long association with SEWA (Self-Employed Women's Association) where she organised women into trade unions, argues the opposite. India’s informal economy is large and here to stay, and our labour laws must accommodate informal workers.

Highlights –

• The size and shape of the informal labour economy in India, including its role in India’s economic growth
• The trade offs between a focus on greater productivity and on supporting small and informal enterprises
• How the policy environment excludes informal workers
• The need for a stronger social security net for informal workers

For more information about IDR, go to www.idronline.org. Also, follow IDR on Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter and Instagram.

Read more:

1. Reduce state-level regulatory cholestrol to aid job creation
2. Education, labour and agriculture reforms will usher in individual freedom
3. It’s time to compensate women’s unpaid labour
4. Labour rights have worsened post lockdown
5. Making labour systems work
6. Labour reforms can help reshape India’s growth trajectory
7. There is much in the labour codes that needs to be discussed and debated
8. Promise and pitfalls of new labour deal
9. Remaking India: One Country, One Destiny
10. Making movements resilient
11. Questioning the informal-formal binary
12. A day in the life of labour rights activist

Production by Maed in India

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Former Agriculture Secretary Siraj Hussain and leader of a farmer collective, Kavitha Kuruganthi, discuss the ongoing farmer protests and what they tell us about dissent, and the process of consultation and policy reform in India.

Highlights –

• Why the process of consultation with farmers failed
• What policymakers seemed to have missed, while making these reforms
• How citizens should protest in a democracy, in order for their dissent to be heard
• How we can move forward, in the spirit of democracy

For more information about IDR, go to www.idronline.org. Also, follow IDR on Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter and Instagram.

Read more:

1. Farmer’s Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020
2. Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020
3. Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020
4. The farm acts: all you need to know
5. #FarmLaws2020: A four part video series featuring farmers, investors, among others
6. Who are arthiyas?
7. Farmers have a right to be heard
8. Farmers’ protests: A volunteer’s diary
9. “These laws will make us poorer”
10. Rebuilding democracy in the 21st century: listening to people not like us

Production by Maed in India

Donate: https://idronline.org/donate/

Welcome to India Development Review's podcast, On the Contrary, a show that brings you a better understanding of the most pressing issues of our time by listening to informed yet differing perspectives. In every episode, host and thought leader, Arun Maira brings two experts from different fields, regions, and worldviews to explore their similarities and differences on a topic, to find a new, shared understanding.    Tune in every Wednesday on your favourite podcasting app.   For more information about IDR, go to https://idronline.org/.   Production by Maed in India

Donate: https://idronline.org/donate/