Excelsior Correspondent
KATHUA, May 20: Former minister and District Congress Committee president from Kathua, Dr Manohar Lal Sharma today lambasted the Government for proposing changes in Labour laws and said that rather than encouraging workers to return by securing wages and improving working conditions, the amendments introduced by several states are removing basic Labour law protections.
While speaking to a group of workers, Congress leader said that seeing present migrant crisis, several states have amended existing Labour laws, either suspending them all together or increasing working hours and said it is the worst time to make amendments to the Labour laws. These changes will make the workers more vulnerable to job losses, especially at a time when the country should be joining hands to rebuild their lives and the economy hit by the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said the heart-wrenching reports of stranded migrant labourers across states, who have been forced to sleep on railway tracks and walk back for hundreds of kilometers to their native places due to the nationwide lockdown restrictions, are growing evidence of “workers being treated badly by both their employers and the Government.
Manohar Lal further said that there is a need to reinforce safety provisions but it is surprising to observe that after the recent Visakhapatnam gas plant tragedy, the Govt amended law and have done away with the need of even installing a fire extinguishers, if an industrial unit employs less than 50 people.
DCC president alleged that Govt is non-serious about the plight of labourers and recent stopping of permission to buses by UP Govt, reflects that BJP is more busy in doing politics rather than helping and reaching to poor and labour class of the country.
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