Hon.
Chairperson, Sir, thank you for giving me this opportunity to participate in
this discussion. These three Codes that have been brought by the
Government today with a view to consolidating 25 Central laws is an
extraordinary event. I do not believe that an exercise of this nature has ever been
attempted in the past because together these Bills have 411 clauses and 13 schedules
running into 350 pages. It is something extraordinary. I am not sure how many honourable
Members have been able to read them in this short period of time. I
am sure, the Minister has had a painstaking job in putting this together.
The Standing Committee has, of course, laboured literally over several
months on many120 of
the key provisions of this Bill. The Government says that it has
accepted almost 74 per cent of the140
recommendations of the Standing Committee. Be that as it may, there are many
novel features which I need to flag160
before this hon. House for discussion. The first Code is the Wages Code which
was brought in 2019 and we all welcomed it at that point in time. Now, of these
three Codes, one is the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions
Code, 2020. One of the criticisms that we have seen has been the
excessive use of delegated legislation that is running through most of these
Codes. This is something that I have personally seen. Hon. Law Minister will240 appreciate that sometimes delegated
legislation can create all sorts of problems. For instance, the Code
does not specify many of the provisions with regard to the earlier Acts;
for example, guaranteed access to drinking water, canteen, washrooms etc. These
have been280 left out
now for delegated legislation. Some minimum corpus of health and safety
standards ought to have been defined in the Code itself and could
very easily have been done and might have been salutary. The other thing
is320 about clause 127 which
allows the Central Government and State Governments to exempt by notification
any establishment from the provisions of this Code. Now, this growth in
economic activity cannot obviously provide a carte blanche for suspension of
basic health360 and safety
standards. This is something that the House must consider carefully whether this
should be permitted and allowed in a Code which is now being brought
in. I must straightway tell the House that in the context of the State of
Odisha, the Standing Committee has commended many novel initiatives which
have been adopted by the Government of Odisha420 both inside and outside the State for
the benefit of occupational safety, health, and working conditions of the
inter-State migrant workers during this period. Many people say that
there are a lot of migrant labourers going out of Odisha to work outside
and there are not enough employment opportunities in the State of
Odisha. That is entirely wrong. My friends480 who keep saying that must understand that
there is an equally large number of people who come from
neighbouring States to work in Odisha. India is one country where there is
freedom of movement. Everybody, according to their skill set, works in
particular conditions in particular industries. So, let us not say that
people go out of Odisha because the State of Odisha has not developed enough.
But the point is that many welcome initiatives like migrant labour help desk,560 seasonal hostels for children of migrant
workers, and the strengthening of Anti Human Trafficking Unit are all important
provisions that we have brought in. These can be considered at
some point of time because these Codes will, undoubtedly, see many600 amendments and changes over the years
because these cannot be static and nothing is carved on stone.
Therefore, I have no doubt about this. The other thing that we have
done in the State of Odisha is that we have640 also given a couple of
suggestions to the Central Government. The phrase ‘appropriate government’ in clause
2 needs to be relooked by the Central Government because the Central Government
seems to appropriate everything to itself. You must understand that law and
order is a State subject. Therefore, the State Government ought to be
the ‘appropriate government’ for the purpose of700 occupational safety and health in
Central Government factories and other major ports because these are now
being administered by the720
State Government. So, you cannot have the State Government administering
them and the Central Government being the ‘appropriate government’. This is
something that the honourable Minister will probably need to look into. One
salutary thing that we have done in Odisha is about this whole concept of ‘Inspector
Raj’. Clause 2 of the Code still talks of ‘Chief Inspector’. In our State,
we call them `Director’. Section 2 defines the term ‘worker’. You must re-look
into this definition of a800
worker as one who is drawing Rs. 18,000. I think it is too low a
threshold amount. Workers in today’s age and as per our level of inflation,
should not get less than Rs. 30,000. I think Rs. 30,000 should840 be a basic benchmark for workers today.
Basically, it comes to Rs.1200 a day. This is such a large Code that one cannot
talk of everything. So, I am only talking about very basic things. The
Second Code is the Code on Social Security. Clause 142 mandates Aadhar
verification. This is something that we have debated again and again.
The Supreme Court has said that it can be done by legislation. Now,
this again does not do it by legislation necessarily because you have left it
to delegated legislation. So, you insist upon Aaadhar by delegated legislation.
Please have a look at it because Odisha has set an example again. During the
COVID-19 pandemic, we exempted Aadhar verification for obtaining960 goods under the PDS because many people
did not have it. The other thing that I need to show is980 that there is some delegated
legislation again on some other issues, but I am not going into that as
it is going to take too much time. One of the criticisms of this legislation
is going to be that there is a lot of encroachment upon the powers of the
States. The objective of the Building and Other Construction Workers’ Welfare Cess
Act is to augment the resources of the State Boards constituted under the
Building and Other Construction Workers Act. Here again, the Central Government
encroaches far too deep into the domain of the State Government. These are
basic1080 bulwarks of the
State Government. Therefore, I urge upon the Central Government to re-visit and
re-look into this at some point in time.
The
last one is the Industrial Code. On the Industrial Code, I have a very serious
concern.1120 Hon. Law Minister
will again bear with me on this. Clause 55 on the dispute resolution mechanism
allows the appropriate Government, State or Centre, to modify or reject an
award issued by the Tribunals in the interest of public grounds affecting
national economy or social justice. The honourable Minister will recall it since
he is a senior counsel of great eminence. There was an identical provision
of Section 17A in the Industrial Disputes Act. This was struck down by
the1200 Andhra Pradesh High
Court. A similar provision was also struck down by the Madras High Court. This
is bound to be challenged. You cannot undo a quasi-judicial court’s order by
legislation or by executive action. Therefore, I believe that something
like clause 55 is not going to stand and if it is challenged, then it
is not going to stand1260
the scrutiny of the courts. Apart from that, there are many other provisions in
Industrial Relations Code which have diluted1280
the provisions with regard to trade unions and strikes. One particular thing
which leaves me a little concerned is the fact that theoretically this Code
leaves open the possibility of an employee who is working on a fixed term
contract almost indefinitely. Now, that is something that is not desirable at
all and I think it is something that the Government will probably need
to re-look into at some point of time. Clause 40 also allows the employer to
change conditions of service related to suspension, misconduct and means of
redress without giving any notice to the worker. This again tilts the balance
of power towards the employer leaving the employee in a very vulnerable
situation. Clause 9 is for1400
registration of trade unions. The notes on clauses included towards the end
of the Bill require the Registrar to decide on the approval or refusal of
registration within 45 days. However, the actual text of the clause does not
specify1440 this. The notes
require the Registrar to give reasons for refusing registration. This is again
missing in the actual text. The reasons are only required to be given in the
case of cancellation of certificate or registration and not for refusal of
registration. That is not a happy situation. So, we see that many of the
essential features of the law which were there in 2019 are no longer specified
in the Codes and have been delegated to be prescribed by the Government
through rules. All I can say is that it has been a painstaking exercise
like I said in the beginning. An exercise which runs into 350 pages and 411 clauses
is bound to have creases. I am, therefore, not shying away from the fact that
while the Government’s intent is good, it may need to iron out many of these
creases.1584
