[sustran] Re: Rickshaw puller in Dhaka earns Tk 6, 300 per month: JICA study

[Ahuja, Sonal (Capita Symonds)]

My question to the group will be, is that money enough for a man with two kids to be able to bring a good healthy family, educate and get yourself out of powerty? Probably not. This earning is about £63 a month.

The income must be measured with its purchase power. And normalised to see the real income. It would be very wrong to admit that that rickshaw pullers have a good standard of living let alone  anywhere a standard comparable to minimum wage earners in Europe leave alone rickshaw pullers in London.

I agree with Aashish, in our resarch on richshaw pullers in Old Delhi conducted in I999 we found that 98% of rickshaw pullers take this profession not out of choice and more than 73% pay a rent for it. So what is meaning ful let as an income is debatable.

I know the reserch is old but I don't things have changed a lot in India and in Banglsdesh.

With warm regards

Sonal

Sonal Ahuja

Associate Director, 

Development Transport and Infrastructure

CAPITA SYMONDS
86 Fetter Lane
London EC4A 1EN 

United Kingdom

 



Kind Regards Sonal +447788666523

----- Original Message -----
From: sustran-discuss-bounces+sonal.ahuja=capita.co.uk at list.jca.apc.org <sustran-discuss-bounces+sonal.ahuja=capita.co.uk at list.jca.apc.org>
To: Global 'South' Sustainable Transport <sustran-discuss at list.jca.apc.org>
Sent: Sun Dec 27 04:08:16 2009
Subject: [sustran] Re: Rickshaw puller in Dhaka earns Tk 6,300 per month: 	JICA study

I wrote this to Sudhir earlier, thought I must share my response to the
others.

While I am able to appreciate the finding that Rikshaw Pullers earn 6,300 Tk
from us, it must be mentioned that Income earned might not be a good
criteria of whether the lives of Rickshaw pullers are 'deprived' or not.

Consider for instance that most will lack any form of insurance - health,
life, assets etc. - which means that one accident or illness and their
savings are wiped out, plus the fact that they cant work for the time they
are ill; most live in squalor which increases health risks and is a form of
degraded living. There is much inclusion from social services (one form of
deprivation) as well as a high level of livelihood risks - some emanating
from the occupation itself.

Just to clarify, while we are supportive of Rickshaws in cities, we must
recognise that even when they earn a good income, there are many avoidable
risks and hazards which they face.

In this context, Sudhir recommended the following link -
http://cai-asia.blogspot.com/2009/07/transport-refugees-victims-of-unjust.html
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