Now suicides may come from weavers belt: Planning Com Member

New Delhi, Mar 14 (UNI) After Vidharba, suicides reports may now come from the weavers belts in Uttar Pradesh.

The warning has been given by Planning Commission Member Dr Sayeeda Hameed who has made an extensive tour of the area.

Addressing a seminar on Muslim women here, she said she had come across families of weavers who were surviving on as meagre a wage as Rs 30 per day, which had brought them to the brink of starvation.

The problems of these workers need to be addressed at the earliest if the nation does not want another vidharba-like situation developing elsewhere, said Dr Hameed.

She later told UNI that the Planning Commission has been appraised of the matter. It was considering proposals for starting new schemes to supplement weavers wages, and also to make handloom affordable for the commomnman to create the market for the product.

She said she had held a meeting with Texiles Minister Shankar Singh Vaghela during which she had suggested waiving the premium on insurance schemes for weavers.

''By working 12 hours a day, they hardly earn enough to afford two square meals a day, so it was next to impossible for them to pay Rs 200 as monthly premium,'' she said.

Earlier, while addressing the seminar, Dr Hameed said the Sachar Committee in its report on the conditions of Muslims had brought out facts that were known earlier too.

''The problem is wellknown, so the moot point was what was the remedy,'' she added.

Dr Hameed said the Planning Commission was devising its intervention for minorities in the light of the Prime Miniter's 20-point programme.

''Today, as per the findings of the Sachar Committee, Muslims have been overtaken by even Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and other Backward Classes in development. As Many as 43 pc of Mulsims live Below Poverty Line, their work participation was just nine per cent,'' she said and exhorted the community to come forward for making maximum use of various schems for their welfare.

The Planning Commission Member said she was witnesing positive development among Muslim women of recognising the importance of education.

''If education has not reached Muslim women, they are themselves now eager to reach out to education. This is what I have found during my extensive tours in different parts of the country,'' she said.

She exhorted the community to make a progressive interpretation of Qur'an, as the book itself has a provision for 'ijtehad', which means reinterpretation of Qur'anic laws in the light of changing circumstances Underlining that the 11th Plan was for inclusive growth and its special emphases was on the education of women, she said it had given Rs 500 to the Ministry of Minority Affairs and expects it to work out schemes to the maximum benefit of minorities.

The Seminar 'Muslim Woman, a Disempowered Entity?' had been organised by the Sociology Department of Jamia University.

UNI