People's Democracy

 CITU Refutes Labour Minister’s Version

THE union labour minister, Dr Sahib Singh Verma, while briefing the media on the outcome of the recently concluded session of the Indian Labour Conference had claimed that “two new bills on the unorganised sector workers and contract labour were unanimously accepted and are likely to be introduced in the winter session of Parliament” (Times of India, Oct. 20). 

In a press release, M K Pandhe, general secretary, CITU, described this as an ‘absolute concoction’ not borne out even by the reports circulated to the plenary session of the ILC.

First, the labour ministry did not circulate any revised draft of the unorganised sector workers bill, in spite of the demand made by the workers’ side that the draft reportedly cleared by the GoM chaired by the deputy prime minister be placed before the ILC. Second, there was no agenda item even before the ILC relating to any new bill on contract labour.

The report of the committee on rationalisation of labour laws placed before the ILC only recorded the workers’ views and employers’ views and ended with expressing a pious wish that “the discussion should further continue to reach a consensus”. The report of the committee on unorganised labour only recorded a long list of suggestions and recommended that “consequential amendments be made to the draft bill (circulated in May 2003) on the basis of these suggestions before it is placed to the legislature”. The report also noted that the recommendations of the National Seminar held last year “could have been suitably incorporated while drafting the bill”. These recommendations comprise adequate safeguards for ensuring minimum wage security, taking into account the suggestions of the 15th ILC, the study group set up by the SNCL and the Supreme Court judgement in the Raptakos Brett case on minimum wage fixation. The report also noted the trade union representatives’ views that “much more detailed ground level tripartite consultations were a necessary pre-requisite before the bill is posed to the legislature”. Further the financial sustainability of the schemes and infrastructure for implementation thereof are crucial questions, which remain to be addressed.

The CITU press release urged the labour minister to respect the ethos of tripartism and not indulge in fake claim of ‘unanimous acceptance’, where there was really none. It cautioned that if the central government ventured to proceed with the introduction of the two bills, as stated by the labour minister, the move would only be an infringement of the tripartite consultation process and meet with total resistance by the trade unions.