Sitting on the floor of her hut, Ramzanbi has to decide which of her two children she can afford to feed. Since her husband lost his power-loom job in Bhiwandi, Maharashtra, she has run out of cash and is faced with a choice no parent should have to make.
Five months after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the withdrawal of high-value currency notes in order to rein in corruption, the funding of terrorism and counterfeiting, the plight of workers, especially women, in the unorganized sector who reside in slums has deteriorated rapidly.
Informal employment and a cash economy dominate India’s labour market. More than 90 per cent of workers – some 400 million people – are employed in the informal sector. Many of them keep their savings tucked away in cash rather than using banks. In November they suddenly discovered they couldn’t use 500 or 1,000-rupee notes, which together amounted to more than 80 per cent of the value of all notes in circulation before demonetization.
Women like Ramzanbi who run their households are unable to make ends meet. ‘My husband got a job at a tea stall after the power loom shut. He made 100 to 200 rupees [$1.50 to $3] a day. But these days, people don’t even have money for tea, so the owner shut down the stall,’ she explains.
Many are finding it impossible to pay school fees for their malnourished children or to get medicines for ailing family members. While the middle class can manage without cash by using debit cards, for the poorest strata of society – who don’t even have bank accounts – demonetization has translated into desperation.
