Social Security Bill for unorganised sector

Kolkata, Aug 12: The UPA government would introduce the Social Security Bill for unorganised labourers in the budget session of Parliament, Union Minister of State for Labour Chandrashekhar Sahu said today.

"We have received draft Bills from the National Advisory Council (NAC) and Arjun Sengupta Committee and one draft Bill has been prepared by the Labour Ministry. We are going through the draft Bills and the Bill will be formally introduced in the budget session of Parliament," Mr Sahu told reporters here.

He said the Bill would include pension after 60 years and free medical treatment facilities.

"The pension will be fixed at the rate of either Rs 300 or Rs 500 per month and a separate machinery has to be created for formation of the corpus which will be in the region of Rs 8000 crore in the first year and Rs 25000 crore in the five years time," the minister said.

The country presently has 43 crore labourers in the unorganised sector, the minister said.

Mr Sahu said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has convened a meeting with cabinet ministers and trade union leaders to discuss the Bill. A Committee has also been formed with Group of Ministers (GOMs) and secretaries of different ministries to discuss the ways and means of creation of the corpus for meeting the expenses once the Bill was made into an Act, the Minister said.

To a question on Labour Law reforms, he said as a policy the UPA government would not push for Labour reforms unless there is consensus among all the stakeholders.

He said in the recent meeting of Central Board of Trustees the government has mooted the proposal to bring the construction workers under the Providend Fund Act.

To a question on the Wage Board for Journalists, he said the Wage Board would be formed within the current year and file has been put up within the ministry.

UNI