Landless agricultural labourers

Topic: Employment, Unemployment and Informalisation · NCERT: Class 10, Ch 1 "Development"; Class 10, Ch 2 "Sectors of the Indian Economy"; Class 10, Ch 3 "Money and Credit"

Meaning

Landless agricultural labourers are rural workers who own no land of their own. They earn a living by working for wages on other people's farms. They belong to the unorganised sector and depend on landowner-employers for both work and credit (loans).

This group matters because the same landowner controls both their wage and their debt. That makes them among the easiest workers to exploit. Many of them come from SC, ST and backward communities, so they also face discrimination on top of low income.

Explanation

Who they are and where they fit

• Unorganised sector: small, scattered units that are mostly outside government control. Rules exist but are often not followed. Jobs are low-paid and irregular, with no paid leave, no holidays and no job security.
• Landless agricultural labourers are the bottom rung of rural unorganised work.
• They have no land, so they cannot grow their own food.
• Their only asset is their labour.

• Work is seasonal. It is plentiful at sowing and harvest time and scarce in between.

• They are different from other rural unorganised groups:

• Small and marginal farmers have land (owned or leased), even if it is very little.
• Sharecroppers farm someone else's land and pay the owner a share of the crop.
• Artisans (weavers, blacksmiths, carpenters, goldsmiths) sell a craft, not farm labour.

The double dependence: work and credit

• Dependence 1: work
• The landowner is often the only employer in the village.

• The labourer has no contract and no fixed wage, so the landowner decides the pay.

• Dependence 2: credit

• Banks ask for collateral (an asset such as land, which the lender can take if the loan is not repaid).
• Landless labourers have no land to offer, so formal banks do not lend to them.

• They borrow from the landowner or a moneylender. These are informal sources of credit, with high interest and no rules (Class 10, Money and Credit).

• How the two dependences lock together:

• The labourer borrows from the landowner to meet a need such as illness, a wedding or a crop-season gap.
• The landowner then asks the labourer to work for them, often at low wages, until the loan is repaid.
• Low wages make repayment slow, so the labourer borrows again. This is a debt trap, where the loan grows faster than the person can repay it.
• Class 10 illustrates this with the case of Rama, a landless labourer who stays in debt to the landowner who employs her.

What makes their condition better or worse

• Worse:
• Organised jobs are growing slowly, so rural workers have few ways out of farm labour.
• More people seek farm work than farms need, so landowners can keep wages low.

• They have no fixed employer, so no one is clearly responsible for their wages, safety or old-age income.

• Better:

• Cheap formal credit through banks and cooperatives breaks the landowner's hold over the debt.
• Other rural jobs, such as a rural employment guarantee, give workers a choice besides the landowner.

• Social security (pension, health cover, accident cover) means one illness does not push the family into debt.

• Protection is needed on three fronts: wages, safety and health (Class 10, Ex. 22).

In India

• Legal framework:
• The Code on Social Security, 2020 is now the main law on social security for unorganised workers. It came into force on 21 November 2025 [2].
• It subsumed (absorbed) the Unorganised Workers' Social Security Act, 2008.

• The NCEUS (National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector) pushed for universal social security, meaning cover for all workers and not just the organised sector.

• Registration: e-Shram (2021)

• e-Shram is a national database of unorganised workers. Each registered worker gets an e-Shram UAN (Universal Account Number), a single ID that stays with them.
• It had 31.42 crore registrations as of 22 December 2025 [3].

• When registrations crossed 30.68 crore in 2025, women made up 53.68% of them [4].

• Pension schemes a landless labourer can join:

• PM-SYM (Pradhan Mantri Shram Yogi Maan-dhan, 2019) is a contributory pension. The worker pays a monthly amount, and the scheme pays ₹3,000 a month from age 60.

• Atal Pension Yojana (2015) is a second pension option for workers outside formal pension schemes.

• Portability for migrant labourers:

• Many landless labourers migrate to other states for seasonal work.
• One Nation One Ration Card lets them draw subsidised rations from any ration shop in India.
• The e-Shram UAN gives them one ID for all unorganised-worker schemes.

Don't confuse with

• Marginal farmer: operates less than 1 ha of land, whether owned or leased. A landless labourer operates no land and only sells labour.
• Sharecropper: farms someone else's land and pays the owner a share of the crop. A landless labourer is paid a wage for work on the owner's land and takes no crop risk.
• Casual worker (urban): also hired day by day with no contract, but works mainly in construction, trade and transport in towns, not on farms.
• Disguised unemployment: this describes a situation, where more people work on a farm than it needs, so some add nothing to output. Landless agricultural labourers are a category of worker. Disguised unemployment is usually found among family members working on their own small plot.

Prelims Hooks

• Landless agricultural labourers belong to the rural unorganised sector. They depend on landowners for both work and credit.
• They have no collateral, so they rely on informal credit (landowners, moneylenders). This can lead to a debt trap.
• Trap: a small farmer operates 1-2 ha and a marginal farmer operates under 1 ha. Together they were about 86% of operational holdings (Agri Census 2015-16). Landless labourers are not counted in either group.
• PM-SYM (2019): contributory pension of ₹3,000 a month from age 60 for unorganised workers. APY began in 2015.
• e-Shram (2021) gives each unorganised worker an e-Shram UAN. It had 31.42 crore registrations by 22 December 2025 [3].
• The Unorganised Workers' Social Security Act, 2008 is now subsumed in the Code on Social Security, 2020, which came into force on 21 November 2025 [2].

Mains Points

• Breaking the double dependence:
• When the same landowner controls the wage and the loan, the labourer cannot bargain.
• Policy has to work on both sides. Formal credit without collateral (banks, cooperatives, self-help groups) weakens the landowner's hold over the debt, and other job options (rural employment guarantee, non-farm work) weaken the hold over the wage.

• This fits GS-III themes of inclusive growth and financial inclusion.

• The registration-to-benefit gap:

• e-Shram has 31.42 crore registrations (December 2025) [3], but registration by itself gives the worker nothing.
• Benefits reach a landless labourer only when the ID is linked to schemes such as PM-SYM, APY and health cover, and when those benefits are portable across states (e-Shram UAN, ONORC).

• Portability matters because many landless labourers are seasonal migrants.

• The old informal economy vs the new gig economy:

• Landless labourers, marginal farmers and artisans far outnumber gig workers, and many are SC/ST workers who also face discrimination.
• Universal social security (the NCEUS vision) must reach them together with credit and market access. Otherwise policy ends up serving only the more visible gig workforce.

Related concepts

• Small and marginal farmers
• Gig worker
• Platform worker
• Universal social security
• Portability of benefits

Read more

• Protecting unorganised, gig and platform workers