CII Uttarakhand COVID Task Force Interacted with Secretary Labour, Uttarakhand
CII Uttarakhand COVID Task Force interacted with Mr H S Chugh, Secretary Labour and other officials of the Labour Department, Uttarakhand over a virtual platform with an objective of apprising them on the issues of concern to industries in Utarakhand. Mr Ashok Windlass, Chairman, CII Uttarakhand and Mr Vikas Garg, Chairman, CII Uttarakhand COVID Action Task Force briefed the department on the issues and also made recommendations in the interest of industry. Some of the issues discussed included -
· Government should support industry and workers by paying them wages through ESIC.
· Since the industry is not in a position to continue to pay wages to workers without any work, more so if the operations are not resumed fully and fast enough, there is a need to look at more sustainable models where the burden on each segment is bearable and can be sustained for a long time.
· The non-workers (supervisory and managerial staff) being paid higher salaries should not be covered under the mandated compulsory payment of salaries, should be left to industry to negotiate a suitable arrangement with the staff.
· Workers who have illegally travelled back to their native places and others who are not reporting to work where the unit is operational should not be paid any wages during lockdown period and industry should be allowed to lay them off as they have to hire alternate people to remain operational.
· A gap of one hour between shifts is not practical for Food Processing & Continuous Process industries. As per Annexure 1 of MHA order 1hr gap between the shifts is for office spaces and not manufacturing establishments.
· Since a one hour gap between shifts is not required for shop floor operations, instead of 2 shifts of 11 hours each, permission to run 2 shifts of 12 hrs to be allowed with permission for 24 hrs overtime per week as has been done by other states.
Mr Chugh was appreciative of CII’s efforts of organising virtual meeting and maintaining social distancing which he said is required. He assured that after discussing the issues internally with his team he will revert to all the issues and queries.
Other officers from the Labour department included Ms Deepti Singh, Labour Commissioner, Mr Anil Petwal, Dy Labour Commissioner, Mr R K Singh, & Ms Ranjana.
Industries participated in the interaction included ITC, Nestle, Perfetti, Windlass Biotech, Indo German Brakes, Century Pulp & Paper, Oberai Motors, Forace Polymers.
Other industry associations Sidcul Industry Associaton (SIA), Haridwar & Sidcul Enterpreneurs Welfare Association (SEWS) Pantnagar also participated.
