NEW DELHI: There is an urgent need to create a conducive environment for the workforce and recognize and respect dignity of labour, said Mr. Bandaru Dattatreya, Minister of State (IC) for Labour & Employment, at a conference on ‘Make in India: Creating Labour Architecture for Sustainability and Growth’ organized by FICCI and AIOE.
Speaking about the various initiatives undertaken by his ministry for creating a favorable atmosphere for both industry and workers, Mr. Dattatreya said that the recently launched ‘Shram Shuvidha Portal’ would facilitate ease of reporting at one place for various labour laws, consolidated information of labour inspection and its enforcement.
The portal would enhance convenience of reporting, transparency in labour inspection and monitoring of labour inspection based on key performances indices and provide an effective Grievances Redressal System.
He said that amendments have also been made in the Apprentices Act, 1961 and Labour Laws (Exemption from furnishing returns and maintaining registers) Act, 1988 to promote skill development. India needs to fulfil the aspirations of its youth and it was imperative to impart training and impart skill to workers to make them employable not only in India but also across the globe.
Mr. Dattatreya pointed out that skill sets of Indian workers was very low, hence a MoU was signed with Germany, which possess one of the best skill sets in the world, to impart training to Indian workers. He added that the government was also focusing on unorganized sector which comprised 93% of the workforce. The government was extending its social security schemes to this sector in areas such as healthcare and old age pension.
Mr. Sanjay Bhatia, President, AIOE, said, “We welcome the two new bills, introduced by your ministry – the ‘Small Factories (Regulation of Employment & Conditions of Services) Bill, 2014’ and the ‘Labour Code on Wages Bill, 2015’.
With some modifications, this legislation will benefit small entrepreneurs while, we suggest that a minimum threshold limit for ‘factory’ is necessary to save small household activities. In the ‘Labour Code on Wages Bill’, the Payment of Bonus Act, 1965 should not be clubbed with the Minimum Wages Act, Payment of Wages Act and Equal Remuneration Act, as they are dealing with monthly wages. Bonus being annual payment linked to ‘profit’ or higher productivity is unrelated to the subject, and it may create lot of distortions in the code. We, therefore, strongly plead for taking out Payment of Bonus from the code.”
He stated that in today’s competitive market economy, fixed term employment was needed to execute time bound projects and short term contracts where the manpower employed could be dispensed with on the completion of the project. Recognising this fact, the NDA Government in 2003 had amended Industrial Employment (Standing Orders)
Act, 1946 to introduce ‘fixed term employment’ as one of the categories of employees in the Schedule. This was however repealed in 2007 by the successor government. “We once again request to re-introduce the fixed term employment in the schedule under the relevant legislation.”
Earlier the conference was also addressed by Mr. Arun Maira, Former Member – Planning Commission; Mr. Y K Modi, Member – Governing Body, ILO and Past President – FICCI & AIOEand Dr. A Didar Singh, Secretary General, FICCI, who shared their perspectives.
