Over time, J&K has come dangerously close to becoming what may be called a dailywagers state, a system where informality is not an exception but a rule. Official reports out in public about the number of  dailywagers differ between 61000 to 1,20,000. Whatever the number is, it directly corresponds to the same number of families in a state who suffer since three decades.

This condition did not emerge overnight. Its roots lie firmly in the early 1990s, a decade marked by political instability, armed conflict, administrative breakdown, and governance by emergency. Recruitment processes collapsed, institutions weakened, and survival governance replaced planned administration. In that vacuum, daily-rated labour quietly became the default solution.

The unwritten rule since the nineties was widely known and rarely challenged, follow an MLA, a minister, a bureaucrat, a deputy commissioner, or any influential afsar; start working for a department. Most of these temporary workers were either relatives of the powerfuls or were working in the homes of other powerfuls as cooks, gardeners and helpers. Public health engineering (PHE), Power development department (PDD), Education, Higher Education, Health, Forests, Irrigation, Roads and Buildings, almost every department absorbed informal workers without advertisements, merit lists, or legal sanction. What mattered was access, not aptitude; proximity, not process.

After a few years of the daily-wage system becoming entrenched, the number of college and university graduates in Jammu and Kashmir began to rise sharply. This demographic shift forced a quiet correction in some sectors. Departments such as Health, for the recruitment of Medical Officers; school education, for teachers; and especially higher education, for lecturers, could no longer rely on informal attachments, political recommendations, or backdoor entries. These positions demanded credentials. Advertisements were issued, eligibility conditions were laid down, merit lists were prepared, and selections were made through a defined process. For once, merit had to be seen to be done. This process for these Job profiles is being repeated every year. No continuation at all. This way many applicant’s don’t figure in merit lists anymore despite years of experience. Simply, they lost this temporary job after 5,10, and 15 years of service.

For the administration, this arrangement was convenient. Projects continued, offices functioned, and services were delivered without creating permanent posts or long-term liabilities. For politicians, it created a dependable support base, workers whose livelihoods depended on continued goodwill and whose hopes could be renewed every election cycle. For the workers themselves, it was survival. In an economy with limited private opportunities and a shrinking industrial base, daily-rated work with the state, however exploitative, was still work.

A small minority eventually got regularized. The majority, however, remained where they began, working year after year, sometimes for decades, without job security, pensions, promotions, or social protection.

It is crucial to be honest about political responsibility. Daily-wagerism as a system is largely the legacy of the National Conference, Congress and the People’s Democratic Party, the three parties that governed Jammu and Kashmir for most of the post-1990 period. Under their watch, daily-rated hiring became normalized, expanded, and politically institutionalized. It was not merely administrative failure; it was a deliberate tolerance of informality as a tool of governance.

This does not mean that later governments are absolved of responsibility. But fact of the matter is that the BJP cannot be credited with creating daily-wagerism in J&K. By the time it entered the J&Ks governance structure (2014 BJP-PDP alliance government), the disease was already chronic. What remains open to scrutiny is whether enough was done to dismantle this inherited structure of permanent temporariness.

One of the most damaging aspects of daily-wagerism has been its moral reframing. Over time, exploitation was repackaged as opportunity. A worker who spent 20 years on daily wages was no longer seen as a victim of state failure, but as a “beneficiary awaiting regularization.” The language shifted from rights to patience, from justice to adjustment. In this linguistic shift lies the quiet normalization of injustice.

The legal system, too, has played an ambiguous role. Courts have repeatedly acknowledged the plight of daily wagers, ordering timely wages, continuity of service, or protection from arbitrary disengagement. Yet litigation treats symptoms, not causes. Each judgment offers relief to individuals, not a cure to the system. Without a comprehensive legislative and policy framework, court orders remain bandages on a deep institutional wound.

The fiscal argument often advanced by governments, that regularization would burden the exchequer, also deserves scrutiny. While permanent appointments do carry costs, the hidden costs of daily-wagerism are rarely calculated, low productivity due to insecurity, workplace accidents without compensation, nepotism, mental health stress, family instability, and intergenerational poverty. Cheap labour, in reality, turns out to be expensive for society.

Perhaps the most tragic outcome is intergenerational normalization. Children of daily wagers grow up watching their parents protest outside secretariats, courts, and assembly gates. They inherit not skills or security, but uncertainty. The message absorbed early is stark, public service does not guarantee dignity and security.

In a Union of India that constitutionally promises equality before law, dignity of labour, and equal wages for equal work, this model of daily-wagerism stands in sharp contradiction. The Indian state speaks about formalization, social security, and labour reforms while tolerating a parallel workforce that remains invisible, unprotected, and dispensable. When a government itself becomes the largest violator of decent work principles, it weakens its moral authority across society.

Calling J&K a “daily-wager state” is not rhetorical exaggeration. It reflects a governance style that has relied for decades on informal labour to run essential services. Roads are built, water is supplied, electricity is maintained, hospitals, school, and colleges function, often because daily wagers show up every morning without knowing whether tomorrow’s wage will come.

Why has the problem persisted despite repeated promises? Because partial solutions dominate. Committees are formed, lists are prepared, deadlines are announced. Some workers are absorbed; many are left out. Crucially, new daily wagers continue to be hired, even as old ones wait. Any reform that does not simultaneously absorb the existing workforce and permanently shut the door on fresh casualisation merely resets the problem.

If daily-wagerism is to be cured, the treatment must be systemic, not symbolic. It requires a one-time, time-bound absorption policy based on transparent criteria and a fixed cutoff date. It requires an immediate ban on daily-rated hiring in government, replaced with sanctioned contractual posts that carry social security from day one. It requires independent oversight to prevent backdoor attachments and political interference. Above all, it requires the state to publicly acknowledge its failure.

Governance cannot be built on permanent insecurity. A system that runs on fear, hope, and dependency corrodes institutions from within. It breeds cynicism, weakens merit, and hollows out trust between the state and its citizens.

Jammu and Kashmir’s experience should serve as a warning within the Union of India. When emergency arrangements are allowed to become permanent, and when political convenience overrides constitutional responsibility, informality turns into policy. The result is not just economic injustice, but moral decay.

The question, then, is not whether daily-wagerism can be cured. It is whether the political will exists to end a system that has benefited too many in power for too long. Until that courage is shown, the daily-wager state will remain, not as an aberration, but as a painful reminder of how governance fails when dignity is deferred.