Social security for workers becoming a casualty of enormity of task, govt’s lack of willingness

While the second wave of COVID-19 has severely been impacting business and industries, the social security for workforce in the country is becoming more complex. Neither the employers nor the government seem to have the ability and capacity to protect job losses. In this scenario, social security for the workforce is becoming a casualty due to the enormity of the task on the one hand and lack of willingness of the government on the other.

Though the implementation of the four new central labour codes consolidating 44 labour laws under four categories – Wage Code; Social Security Code; Occupational Safety, Health & Working Conditions Code; and the Industrial Relations Code – has been deferred from April 1, 2021 to an indefinite period, the Centre is still coming out with several directions creating unnecessary confusion and complexities.

For example, the Ministry of Labour & Employment has now been mandated to seek the 12-digit unique identification number of Aadhaar cards from employees and unorganized sector workers seeking registration, benefits, availing services, or receiving any payment under various schemes under the Social Security Code 2020.

It may be mentioned that Aadhaar is not mandatory for availing any benefit or delivery of services under social security schemes, but with the mandate granted to the Ministry of Labour & Employment, officials are insisting on the Aadhaar numbers, which has become a hurdle, in which working class is at the receiving end.

It may be mentioned here that the government had given an assurance that Aadhaar would not be made mandatory, but on the ground level, the situation has become just opposite.

The Social Security Code 2020, or any other code, should not have been implemented, morally or legally, unless rules by the Centre and states were framed and consequently notified. It was precisely for this reason the Centre could not notify the rules in the absence of the state’s failing to frame new rules for notification and implementation from April 1, 2021. It was, therefore, deferred, and now states are busy in tackling the second wave or COVID-19.

The focus has been changing, and neither the Centre is putting pressure on the state for making rules, nor are the states interested presently in making their rules. Industries and business organizations are also lobbying for deferring implementation of the codes to the next year.

There seems to be no chance of the codes to be notified this year for implementation.

It has been officially said that the mandate for seeking Aadhaar numbers under the Social Security Code 2020 is to facilitate database creation, mainly covering people in the informal sectors, like migrant workers. The provisions of section 142 of the Social Security Code has come into force from its date of notification on May 3, which provides for establishing the identity of an employee or an unorganised worker or any other person through Aadhaar number for seeking benefits and availing services under the code.

Thus the new mandate is going to affect the workers under the nine labour laws which were subsumed to form the new Social Security Code. These include the Employee’s Compensation Act, 1923; The Employees' State Insurance Act, 1948; The Employees' Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952; The Employment Exchanges (Compulsory Notification of Vacancies) Act, 1959 and The Maternity Benefit Act, 1961.

The other laws that will be subsumed are The Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972; The Cine-Workers Welfare Fund Act, 1981; The Building and Other Construction Workers' Welfare Cess Act, 1996 and The Unorganised Workers Social Security Act, 2008.

How the workers are at the receiving end can be seen in another example. No special protection has been extended to those covered even under the Employees’ State Insurance (ESI) scheme.

The Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh has written a letter to the Union Labour Minister seeking help for the ESI beneficiaries affected by COVID-19. It said that the workers are deprived of care as ESI hospitals had been converted to dedicated COVID-19 treatment facilities.

On the other hand, the ESI Corporation (ESIC) has extended the date for filing of ESI contribution for the month of April, 2021 to June 15, 2021 to give relief to business and industries. It would benefit 12.36 lakh employers, who would be able to use the deducted money from 3.49 crore insured employees under the scheme. The liquidity boost to employers would be Rs 1,400 crore.

The ministry is also considering a similar measure via the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) which would mean a sizable liquidity boost of Rs 12,500 crore to the employers. The total boost would be around Rs 14,000 crore in these two provisions.

The Union government is providing all such reliefs for business and industries giving a logic that they have been suffering because of shutdowns and COVID-19 containment measures, but one wonders why the same logic is not being applied for social security of the employees who lost their jobs in large numbers and are not left with any means of survival.

Even the money deducted from workers would not be deposited in their accounts immediately, which is immoral.

Workers in unorganized sectors of the economy, such as in informal sector, are in very bad shape because there is total lack of social security in the country.

The initiative taken by the government under MGNREGA and Food Security Act are too little to comprehensively cover all people from the working class. It has been reported from all over the country that programmes are not running properly and many of the workers are excluded systematically due to hurdles created by the red tapism.

Business and Industries are generally treating social and health security to workers as an additional burden, and this mindset should change, while the government needs to support those who want to protect their workers, but not by providing relief to employers at the cost of employees.

Workers are even deprived of a national floor-level minimum wage and social security cover for gig and informal workers is not there at all. The complexities of social security for workforce in all sectors of the economy, including non-business and non-industries sectors such as agriculture, should not be further complicated with ill-conceived ideas.

(IPA Service)

Views are personal