Context: India is one of the largest welfare states in the world and yet, with COVID-19 striking in 2020, the state failed to provide for its most vulnerable citizens. This article highlights the need for universal social protection scheme in India and suggests a way to achieve it.
What is the Social Security/Welfare System?

• According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), Social Security is a comprehensive approach designed to prevent deprivation, give assurance to the individual of a basic minimum income for himself and his dependents and to protect the individual from any uncertainties.

It is also comprised of two elements, namely

• Right to a Standard of Living adequate for the health and well-being, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services.
• Right to Income Security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond any person’s control.

Need For Universal Social Welfare

• Majority of Workforce is in Unorganised Sector: The organised sector workers constitute less than 10% of all workers in India.
• This leaves more than 90% of the workforce without job security, labour rights and post-retirement provisions.
• Also, in a dynamic market-economy, workers will lose jobs at a faster pace with technological changes. Thus, workers need to keep learning to stay productively employed.
• However, in spite of great attention given to skills development in the last 15 years, the results are not very encouraging.

Illness Is Universal, But Healthcare Is Not: Economic capital, in the absence of social capital, has proven to be insufficient in accessing healthcare facilities.

• Further, Out-of-pocket health expenses create barriers to seeking healthcare and can push marginal households into poverty, form as much as nearly 90% of private expenditure on health.
• Also Covid-19 has highlighted the urgency for providing universal free health care. It has demonstrated that private health care can be afforded only by the wealthy.

Inadequate Expenditure on Social Security: India has a broad aim of social protection programs, but the overall public expenditure on social protection (excluding public healthcare) is only approx. 1.5% of the GDP, lower than many middle-income countries across the world.

• Further, the country has over 500 direct benefit transfer schemes for which various Central, State, and Line departments are responsible. However, these schemes have not reached those in need.
• Moreover, existing schemes are fractionalised across various departments and sub-schemes. This causes problems beginning with data collection to last-mile delivery.

Intended Benefits: Having a universal system would improve the ease of application by consolidating the data of all eligible beneficiaries under one database.

• For instance, the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana (PMGKY) is one scheme that can be strengthened into universal social security.
• It already consolidates the public distribution system (PDS), the provision of gas cylinders, and wages for the MGNREGS.

Having a universal scheme would take away this access/exclusion barrier.

• For example, PDS can be linked to a universal identification card such as the Aadhaar or voter card, in the absence of a ration card.

Making other schemes/welfare provisions like education, maternity benefits, disability benefits etc. also universal would ensure a better standard of living for the people.
Case Study: Universal Social Welfare Model

• An example of such a social protection scheme is the Poor Law System in Ireland.
• In the 19th century, Ireland, a country that was staggering under the weight of poverty and famine, introduced the Poor Law System to provide relief that was financed by local property taxes.
• These laws were notable for not only providing timely assistance but maintaining the dignity and respectability of the poor while doing so.
• They were not designed as hand-outs but as necessary responses to a time of economic crisis.
• Today, the social welfare system in Ireland has evolved into a four-fold apparatus that promises social insurance, social assistance, universal schemes, and extra benefits/supplements.

Suggestion

Emulating Pulse Polio Universal Immunisation Programme: We have seen an example of a universal healthcare programme that India ran successfully — the Pulse Polio Universal Immunisation Programme.

• In 2014, India was declared polio-free. It took a dedicated effort over a number of years.
• With the advancements in knowledge and technology, a universal coverage of social welfare is possible in a shorter time frame.
• The implementation can be eased through a focus on data digitisation, data-driven decision-making and collaboration across government departments.

Building on Existing Systems: The Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana (PMGKY) is one scheme that can be strengthened into universal social security.

• It already consolidates the public distribution system (PDS), the provision of gas cylinders, and wages for the MGNREGS.

Urban MGNREGA: MGNREGA has proved its utility by providing employment to millions of workers who have reverse migrated.

• Thus, there is a case for extending this programme to urban areas with municipal bodies being given the responsibility for providing a fixed no of days work to all those seeking it.
• Municipal bodies have a range of work to get done, such as improving sanitation, minor repairs, in which they could productively use labour.

Providing Universal Health Coverage: There is a need to establish the Ayushman Bharat-National Health Agency at all levels of governance for management of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Aarogya Yojana (PM-JAY).

• Further, there is a need to review and iron out the challenges with the business model of Jan Aushadhi stores to ensure that they can function as self-sustaining entities and scale up rapidly across the country.

Road Ahead

• International experience also emphasizes the need to move away from a one-size-fits-all model by allowing sub-national governments greater flexibility as political economy, labor markets, demographic attributes and risk profiles vary by location.
• Hence, or establishing an universal social protection architecture, India should enable local governments to design, plan and deliver a core basket of benefits within a nationally defined policy framework and budget.