Amid a fall in employment in the public sector, labour minister Sis Ram Ola on Monday ruled out regularising 18.44 lakh contract labourers in central government departments and public sector enterprises, but promised punitive steps if such workers are paid less than permanent staff for similar kind of work.
?There is no provision to regularise contract workers under the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act of 1970,? Ola said in a written reply to Parliament.
However, he said contract and permanent workers are supposed to be paid the same wages for similar kind of work as per Rule 25 of the Contract Labour Act. ?Any contravention of this provision is punishable under Chapter V1 of the Act,? he added.
The industrial slowdown has prompted many companies to cut jobs especially contract workers in the past few quarters even as trade unions are mounting pressure on the government to regularise contract workers, treble minimum wages and tighten labour laws.
While the number of strikes and lock-outs have halved to 229 in 2012 from 456 in 2005, industrial unrest is becoming more high-profile and shaken some of the big corporates like Maruti Suzuki and Bajaj Auto in recent years. Even in PSUs, strikes have hurt operations ? Air India pilots? strike lasted for 58 days in 2012 while a two-day strike in February 2012 choked banking operations.
Government data showed jobs in organised sector increased at a sluggish pace to 289.99 lakh at the end of March 2011 from 287.08 in 2010-11, and 275.49 lakh in the pre-crisis year of 2007-08. While jobs in public sector declined to 175.48 lakh in March 2011 from 178.62 lakh in March 2010, the figure rose to 114.52 lakh from 108.46 lakh in the private sector.
While regular job offerings have slowed, the hiring of contract labourers has gone up in recent years as companies are trying to cut costs and protect profit margins.
