An International Indexed Online Journal
www.darpanonline.org/GIRT
Global International Research Thoughts
ISSN 2347–8861
January-March- 2014
The Economic attributes of
migration in Jammu
*
Sunita Bai Yadav,
Research Scholar,
Deptartment of Geography,
Singhania University, Rajasthan
**
Dr. Satyaveer Yadav
Professor,
Department of Geography,
ABSTRACT The economic attributes of a population relate to the economic activities of people. Economic attributes indirectly offer a peep into the social fabric of a group. An analysis of a population's economic composition unfolds the diverse economic, socio‐ demographic and cultural attributes of an area, which forms the basis for region's social and economic development. These characteristics unfold the type of economy prevailing in the area. It is in this backdrop that an attempt is being made to understand the economic activities being undertaken by the Kashmiri migrants in their new habitats. KEYWORDS : Economic Attributes, Population, Migration.
OCCUPATIONAL STRUCTURE According to the Webster's Dictionary of English Language, occupation is defined as any "economically gainful activity by which one earns one's living or fills one's times". The term is largely associated with the adult group of society. 'Occupational Structure' refers to the distribution of working population in different occupations. Each person in a population is a consumer but only a small proportion of population contributing to its production. So, the population of a region can be divided into two categories: Working population (economically active population), and Non‐working population (dependents). Working population is that population which is participating in any economically gainful or productive work. It includes self‐employed persons (businesspersons, doctors, engineers, etc.), Global International Research Thoughts (GIRT) Page 1 An International Indexed Online Journal
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Global International Research Thoughts
ISSN 2347–8861
January-March- 2014
those employed in government service and private service, employers, daily wagers, laborers, servants etc. On the other hand, non‐working population consists of housewives, unemployed persons, those pursuing education (full time students), infants (children), disabled, old persons and the people receiving money without participating in any productive activity such as pensioners, relief holders, family pensioners, etc. The proportion of a population that is economically active is an important factor which affects the entire stream of production. It is influenced by factors like age‐ structure, age at marriage, average family size, levels of income, level of education and state of health. In the under‐
developed and developing countries the work force tends to be small and there is heavy dependence on work force owing to high proportion of children and seniles in the population‐ The proportion of workers and non‐workers of the selected households of the Kashmiri migrants in Jammu Tehsil. Depending upon the magnitude of work force the selected areas it is evident that in four areas the work force is extremely low i.e below 20%. These are Mishriwala, Purkhoo‐I, II, Nagrota and Purkhoo ‐ ill migrant camps. In one area i.e. Muthi Camp Phase‐ll, the work force is 20% and as such lies in the second category. Six areas fail under the third category, where workforce is between 25 ‐ 30These areas are Bantalab, Janipur, Durga Nagar, Muthi Camp Phase‐l, Bohri and Gangyal. The.highest percentage of work force (above 30%) is in the Mutht Village, which has been placed in the fourth category. However, in all the categories the work force is substantially low. The reasons for the low work force among Kashmiri migrants in Jammu have been summarized as under: 1. Fairly large student/child population, 2. Less participation of women in the economic activities, 3. unsuitable/unsatisfactory jobs for the educated, 4. Lack of job opportunities, 5. The problem of unemployment, 6. Out‐migration of educational workers. Apart from these reasons, another important contributing factor is the absence of Agricultural activity in the new habitats. "Majority of the Kashmiri migrants belonging to rural areas in Kashmir were owners of agricultural lands, orchards etc. and were, thus, engaged in productive work in one or the other form. After migration, the whole lot of agricultural workers remains idle, and thereby contributing to the huge non‐working force. This is evident from the fact that camps which are dominantly inhabited by population having rural background have lesser percentage of workforce than their counterparts ‐ the camp migrants (which have predominance, of urbanites). The percentage of work force in camps being 19.25% and that in non‐camp areas being 23.75% respectively. AGE AND SEX‐WISE OCCUPATIONAL STRUCTURE Age structure is an important variable is measuring the occupational structure of a society The occupational structure varies with respect t o , the labour class (1 9 ‐ 5 9 years) than the old age class (60 years and above) because the former are economically active due to their physique and health. The Table 5.4 which gives the age and sex‐wise occupational structure of Global International Research Thoughts (GIRT) Page 2 An International Indexed Online Journal
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Global International Research Thoughts
ISSN 2347–8861
January-March- 2014
Kashmiri migrants in Jammu, reveals an interesting feature of the occupational structure of migrants. The workforce in all age groups is highly dominated b y males. In contrast to this there is a substantial contribution of females in the non‐workers category. It is quite clear that the overall percentage of male workers among Kashmiri migrants is 9070 while that of female workers is as low as 9.30%. This indicative of less participation of migrant women in the economic activities In view of the fact that nearly 92% of these migrants are engaged in the tertiary sector,.the active labour force is nil after attaining retirement. No doubt, some people above the age of 60 years age also engaged in some type of economic activity but their work has little significance in strict economic terms. SECTORAL DIVISION OF ECONOMY The economy of any society undoubtedly among other things depends upon the strength of its work force. Based on types of activities performed as well as based on modes of production, activities of the work force can be classified as under: Primary economic activities; Secondary economic activities; and Tertiary economic activities Primary economic activities are related to the production of primary goods. The goods are not primary because they are of primary importance but because they are primarily the first to develop in any economy and their products are essential and vital for human existence (Sinha, 1979, p. 165). The primary group includes several occupations of which the most important is agriculture. It also includes fisheries, forestry and hunting, mining and quarrying. Given the premise the primary economic activity is totally absent in the Kashmiri migrants living in different parts of Jammu tehsil: Although most of them were basically, directly or indirectly, involved with the primary sector in the Kashmir valley but after migration, it has been an altogether a different story: a search for a piece of land for a shelter, let alone agriculture. In the secondary economic activities, the society is associated with the production of material goods, which includes small‐scale industries, household industries, extractive industries, manufacturing industries aqd also the construction work. At the time of survey, 21 out of the total work force of 258 persons were engaged with the secondary economic activities. Tertiary economic activities are composite and include those activities which are not productive of material goods and so embrace commerce, transportation, storage and communication, banking and insurance and service workers (public and private) of all types. The tertiary activities are an index of the socio‐economic status and well‐being of any society/community. The Kashmiri migrants are engaged only in two main types of activities ‐ secondary and tertiary. However, in all the areas the migrants are predominantly placed in the tertiary sector. Lower percentage of secondary activities is because of the low economic development of Jammu, where the industrial base is very weak. It amply clear that overall a very high proportion (91.86 per cent) of workers are engaged in tertiary sector. While the rest (8.13%) are secondary workers. There is almost no disparity with regard to employment in tertiary sector when camp and non‐camp migrants are compared. The Global International Research Thoughts (GIRT) Page 3 An International Indexed Online Journal
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Global International Research Thoughts
ISSN 2347–8861
January-March- 2014
percentage of migrants engaged in tertiary sector in camp and non‐camp areas being 91.83% and 91.88 per cent respectively. MONTHLY FAMILY INCOME Income is one of the important indices of socio‐economic status. Income of a person is related to the nature of his/her occupation. Increase or decrease in income is directly related to the nature and type of job or the economic activity he/she pursues. The mode of life, savings, investment and overall standard of life of people depend on it. Thus, both the income pattern and the trend in growth of income are important for economic analysis of the people. In their native places, as pointed out earlier, majority of the Kashmiri migrants were engaged in primary sector i.e. agriculture, however, after migration there has been a complete shift in their nature of economic activities. There is now total dominance of tertiary and secondary economic activities and not surprisingly, there has been drastic reduction in their income patterns as compared to their native places. However in case of Kashmiri migrants who were in tertiary sector in the places of origin are better off due to increase in wage patterns over the last few years. The following table shows the distribution of respondents according to their monthly income before migration and at present i.e. after migration. The data clearly shows that there is noticeable fall in the earnings of the respondents as compared to their earnings when they were in Kashmir. The above table shows that majority of the migrants (45%) had monthly income Rs. 4000 ‐ 6000 at their native place 6.25 per cent of the respondents had inco less than Rs. 2400 ‐ 4000, while 25.83 per cent migrants had income of Rs. 6000 ‐ 8000. There were just 7.08% and 2.5% of the respondents who had very high monthly income i.e. Rs. 800O ‐ 10000 and 10,000 and above respectively. Thus, it is clear that majority of the migrants were quite well to do in their native places. Their monthly incomes were neither too small nor too much. Agricultural income was supplement to other income particularly for those who were in the secondary or tertiary jobs and as such was an added advantage. However, after migration due to loss of agricultural income and other avenues most of the migrants have to live on the cash assistance provided by the government (maximum of Rs. 2400 per month per family). Thus, almost 48 per cent of the migrants have their income below Rs. 2400 at present. Nearly, 18, 33 per cent of the respondents have monthly of Rs.' 2400‐4000 while 15.83 per cent had income of Rs, 4000 ‐ 6000 per month. There were very few migrants in the upper income groups, of Rs. 6000 ‐ 8000 (8.33 per cent). 8000 ‐ 10000 (5 per cent) and 10,000 and above (3.75%). The migrants in the upper income groups are mostly in the tertiary sector or those who have more than one earning members in the family. Thus, migration has resulted in a great economic loss for the migrants. PROPERTY OWNED Property owned by the family is an important variable in determining socio‐economic status of an individual and his family. Therefore, both the movable and immovable property such as residential, commercial, transport vehicles, agricultural property owned by the respondent families were taken into consideration on white assessing the property ownership. The almost 99 percent of the migrants were having properties of one or the other form in Kashmir valley Global International Research Thoughts (GIRT) Page 4 An International Indexed Online Journal
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Global International Research Thoughts
ISSN 2347–8861
January-March- 2014
but after migration just 55 percent of them are now property owners. In Kashmir they were having immovable property in the form of agricultural land, orchards, frees and residential property. After migration nearly 45 per cent of them are no longer having any property. Majority of them have also lost commercial property in the course of migration or well. REFERENCES : 1. Bamzai, P.N.K. (1962) "History of Kashmir", Delhi: Metropolitan Book Company. 2. Bamzai, P.N.K. (1987) "Socio‐Economic History of Kashmir (1846‐1925)", New Delhi 3. Kanan, K., Sadhu (1987) "Bio‐Demographic‐ A Study of Kashmiris", New Delhi. Gian 4. Publishing House. 5. Kanan, N. (1983) "Studies in Human Migration" New Delhi : Rajesh Publications. 6. Kane, H. (1995) "The Hour of Departure Forces that Create Refugees and Migration. 7. World Watch Paper No. 56. 8. Kapoor, O.P, (1995) "Kashmir‐Convictions Betrayed", Chandigarh: Arun Publishing 9. House Pvt. Ltd. 10. Kaul, Ravender K. (1997) "Perspectives in population characteristics of Non‐camp 11. Kashmiri migrants ‐ A Case Study of Muthi Village (Jammu)*, Unpublished 12. M.Sc.Dissertaion, PGPKU, Dept. of Geog, University of Jammu, Jammu.Behera, 2000, p. 172 13. Madan, T.N. (1965) "Family and Kinship‐A Study of Kashmiri Pundits of Rural Kashmir", 14. New York: Asia Publishing House. 15. Mahmood, Raisul Awal (1994) "Adaptation to a New World. Experience of Bangladeshis 16. in Japan", In International Migration Quarterly. Review Vo). XXXI No. 4, pp 513‐ 17. 523. 18. Mahto, K. (1985) "Population Mobility and Economic Development in Eastern India", 19. Delhi: Inter ‐ India Publishers. 20. Majumdar, R.C. (ed.) (1952) "The Classical Age"; New Delhi: Bhartiya 21. Vidya Bhawan. 22. Mandal, R.B. (1981) "Frontiers in Migration Analysis", New Delhi: Concept Publishing 23. Company. Mangalam, J.J. (1968) "A Guide to Migration", England: Kentucky Press. Global International Research Thoughts (GIRT) Page 5