Labour Minister Mansukh Mandaviya will launch the upgraded version of the eShram portal on Monday in order to make the platform a “one-stop-solution” for unorganised labour to have access to various social sector schemes, an official release said.
The upgraded portal, also known as eShram 2.0, aims to integrate information of beneficiaries of all social security and welfare schemes meant for unorganised workers, who are about 300 million, in an effective manner through a single platform.
As of now, 12 schemes of different Central Ministries/Departments have already been integrated with the eShram. In the upgraded version, more such schemes will be linked with the portal.
Last week, the Labour Ministry held a meeting with representatives of Platform Workers’ associations to discuss ways in which social security protection could be extended to these workers.
The Ministry has asked aggregators to register the workers on the e-Shram portal for generation of their unique IDs, which will be useful in identifying how many platform workers exist in the country, and subsequently in formulating guidelines for extending social security benefits to them. At present, there are about 20 million such workers across India.
“The upgraded version of eShram portal will specifically help in providing social security cover to the platform workers, once they’re registered,” a senior official had said earlier.
The Ministry has established a committee to develop a ‘Framework for providing social security and welfare benefits to gig & platform workers,’ which will gather perspectives from all relevant stakeholders.
As per official sources, various options are on table, such as deducting contribution per transaction, or levying a cess, for providing workers with social security benefits such as health insurance and pension.
Since a gig or platform worker can be working on several platforms, they cannot be brought under the employer and employee relationship. Thus the government is looking at assigning a unique ID to such workers based on which contributions per transaction can be deducted through the platform, according to sources.
Since the launch of e-Shram on August 26, 2021, it has demonstrated its widespread appeal among unorganised labour. “This achievement underscores the social impact of the initiative and the government’s commitment to supporting the nation’s unorganised workers,” the release said.