A Case Study on Unorganised Flower Binding Workers in Nilakottai Block of Dindigul, District, Tamil Nadu

Vending in India falls in the unorganized sector category. Flower vending has been a profession since the ancient period, with street vendors an integral part of our urban history and culture. In contrast to the mechanized and sterile concept of shopping favoured by modern market and supermarket structures. The role of women in and outside their homes has become an essential feature of the social and economic life of the country. Women in our country share too many responsibilities and perform a wide variety of duties in running the family, maintaining the household, attending to labour and domestic animals and extending a helping hand in artisanship and handicrafts. In recent years, women in large numbers have joined the labour force and taken up paid employment. The women’s earnings are necessary for sheer survival and to support their families. It is inferred that flower vendors in the study area get an average annual income of Rs. 86390/. In the study area, almost all the flower vendors borrow money mainly for daily needs according to their capabilities and their average debt amount was Rs. 38836. Regarding job satisfaction and the future continuation of the flower vending business is positive.


Introduction
Vending in India falls in the unorganized sector category. Vending has been a profession since time ancient period, with street vendors an integral part of our urban history and culture. Social interaction is essential to Indian markets, in contrast to the mechanized and sterile concept of shopping favoured by modern market and supermarket structures.

Statement of the Problem
The role of women in and outside their homes has become an essential feature of the social and economic life of the country. Women in our country have too many responsibilities and perform a diversity of duties in running the family, maintaining the household, attending to labour and domestic animals and extending a helping hand in artisan ship and handicrafts. In recent years, women in large numbers have joined the labour force and taken up paid employment. The women's earnings are necessary for sheer survival and to support their families. It is witnessing many women engaged in the vending business, especially flowers on the roadside in the city. The vendors are their living conditions are pathetic and they spend their lives in the open air where there is hot sun or rain. Apart from their hard work, they are harassed by police, local thugs and politicians and they pay them out of their low income. The present research made an attempt to study social economic status and employment status, suggesting measures to improve their status.

Methodology
The town of Nilakottai block has been brought under for the present research. Nilakottai is an age-old town situated in-between Madurai and Batalgudu.
All the roads and rail links to the Southern part of Tamil Nadu from the capital Chennai pass via Nilakottai only. The researcher feels comfort and convenience in choosing this area as the study area which caters for the need of the researcher.

Objectives of the Research
The broad objective of the study is to know the socio-economic facets of the unorganized women workers in flower vending of Nilakottai block.

Methodology
The study is based on both primary and secondary data. Initially, the researcher's list of flower vendors was prepared after a physical verification by the researcher. This is done due to the non-availability of proper official records from the Government offices. And there are around 180 flower vendors identified by the researcher in the study area and it is undetermined. It is decided to have a sample size of 80 by applying simple random sampling. The primary data are collected from the respondents have been classified and tabulated for the purpose of analysis and the data have been scrutinized by using Micro soft excel.

Socio Economic Conditions
All the respondent are women in this present research.
A major flower vendors fall in the age group of 16 -35 years and it accounts 46.67.
A majority of women flower vendors belonged from the Hindu religion.
In the study area almost 60 percent of the flower vendors are married.
In the study area only flower vendors get an average annual income of Rs. 86390/ In the study area almost all the flower vendors borrow money mainly for daily needs according to their capabilities and their average debt amount was Rs. 38836.

Respondent's Opinion Regarding the Flower Vending
The researcher used the Likert scale technique was adopted. The response to each of the items was weighted on a 5-points Likert type scoring scale. The respondents were free to choose Strongly Agree (SA) = 5 points, Agree (A) =4 points, neither Agree nor Disagree (NAD) = 3 points, Disagree (D) =2 points, and Strongly disagree (G) =1 point. From the scale, an average criterion score of 3 was adopted.
The criterion score was obtained as follows: Criterion score = (5+4+3+2+1) /5 = 3.00 Items having a mean score above the criterion score of 3.00 were accepted as employee retention is accepted and while those under 3.00 were not accepted. Source: Primary data From the above table it was observed that the average score about the vender opinion about flower vending was 3.39in selected study town was above the criterion score 3.00. Thus the researcher concludes that women flower vendors were satisfied about the vending business was accepted level.

Hypothesis 1
Ho: The women flower vendors are not satisfied about flower vending business in the study area. From the primary data, the researcher calculated the chi-square (x2) value and the test result are presented as follows.

Conclusion
The in-depth analysis of the socioeconomic facets of the flower vendors in Nilakottai block has led to the unambiguous conclusion that their economic condition is really deplorable and there is a dive need for concrete action plan to upgrade the socioeconomic conditions of the flower vendors.