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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Trade unions pitch for worker-oriented Budget

Trade unions pitch for worker-oriented Budget

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published Published on Jan 17, 2012   modified Modified on Jan 17, 2012
-The Hindu
 
Suggest “necessary preventive” measures to safeguard the interest of workers
 
Trade union groups on Monday pitched for a worker-oriented Budget for 2012-13 aimed at removing poverty and unemployment and suggested “necessary preventive” measures to safeguard the interests of workers.

At their meeting here with Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee — the second in the series of the customary pre-Budget consultations — representatives of trade unions (TUs) proposed that wages of contract labour should be at par with that of the regular workforce and sought necessary changes in company laws to ensure that workers took part in net profit-sharing.

During the discussions, TU representatives suggested that while the Bonus Act and the Gratuity Act be amended, the ceilings on personal income-tax should were also sought to be revised upward. They sought a periodical review of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act scheme and mooted a mechanism whereby malpractices in its implementation could be curbed.

Tackling malnutrition

Alongside, the TU groups felt that the Budget for the new fiscal should address the glaring problems of malnutrition among children, child labour, farmers' suicide and difficulties being faced by women working in self-help groups (SHGs). Some members demanded an assured and reasonable pension amount for all workers to sustain themselves after retirement. It was also suggested that publication of the country's gross domestic product data and employment data be linked and both be published together.

Speaking to the media after the meeting, Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) representative and Rajya Sabha member Dipankar Mukherjee said: “We demanded assured pension for workers of the unorganised sector. Contract workers should get provident fund money ... We spoke against disinvestment. PSUs have Rs 6 lakh crore reserves. This money should be invested for employment generation.”

Participating in the pre-Budget consultations were leaders and representatives of 11 TU organisations, including CITU, Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh , Indian National Trade Union Congress and All India Trade Union Congress , among others.

‘Hike EPF interest'

In their memorandum to the Finance Minister, the TUs urged the government to hike the rate of interest for Employees' Provident Fund (EPF) in keeping with the rising trend of inflation. They also sought a cut in the threshold limit of 20 employees in the EPF scheme to 10, as recommended earlier by the EPFO Central Board of Trustees.

Earlier, in his opening remarks, the Finance Minister pointed to the volatile prices of crude oil which were posing a challenge to containing inflation. Alongside, he said that “the 2008 crisis had engulfed the entire world and thereafter, the euro-zone crisis posed a serious threat to recovery and development of Europe as a whole.” In such a situation, he said management of the current account deficit had become difficult in view of the deceleration in export growth rate in the later part of 2011.


The Hindu, 17 January, 2012, http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/article2807009.ece


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