The death of 21 labourers in two near-consecutive wall collapse mishaps has come us a wake-up call for the Pune civic body administration.
Rattled by the accidents, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) is now planning to send a proposal to the State government recommending that labourers, most of whom are migratory, be housed in rental accommodations that will be built on a government land.
Last week, PMC Deputy Mayor Siddharth Dhende tabled the proposal which, if implemented by the State government, will help mitigate the security hazards to labourers and their families by housing them in areas away from the construction site.
“The proposal will be sent on behalf of the PMC to the State government. The idea is to identify vacant plots of land owned by the State and ask the developers to house their labour force there,” said Mr. Dhende.
He said the funds for building the labourers’ lodgings would come from the Building and Other Construction Workers’ (BOCW) Cess Act, of which a whopping ₹18,000 crore lying unutilised with the State government.
Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Dhende said that hitherto, only a paltry ₹535 crore of this staggering fund money had been utilised since the past decade, making Maharashtra undoubtedly one of the poorest performing among States in expenditure for welfare of their labourers.
“Nearly 80% of the developers in Pune district belong to the ‘small builder’ category, constructing on plots of land ranging from 5 gunthas to 20 gunthas. Invariably, these developers make no provision of basic amenities for their migrant labour force nor are any safety standards adhered to,” he said, stating that of the estimated labour force of 5 lakh workers in the district, barely 1.25 lakh had been registered so far.
“As these workers are never registered, they never avail of the benefits of the 30-odd government schemes designed for them. Moreover, there is no arrangement for their meals or education for their children,” observes Mr. Dhende.
As per the proposal, the rental costs are to be borne by the developers as are the costs incurred to transport labourers from these accommodations to the construction site.
With this, the PMC hopes to square the circle of labourer registrations, while at the same time ensuring a modicum of security for them.
Labour activists and leaders have welcomed the PMC’s proposal, while urging that the proposed accommodations be well-maintained so as to ensure that batches of workers can use them during their stay in the city.
However, the fulcrum in resolving the vexing problem of the labourer’s security is the Labour Welfare Board, says Ajit Abhyankar, senior leader of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and president of the Bandhkam Kamgar Sanghatana, an established city-based outfit working for the weal of the construction worker.
“The apparatus of the district Labour Welfare Board – or the lack of it – is chiefly to blame for this vicious cycle. The labour office here is grossly understaffed, headed by the Labour Commissioner who has just one labour officer and two clerks, usually on a contract basis, under him. The lack of an administrative set-up has led to poor enrolment of the unorganised labourers and as a result they do not avail of their benefits,” Mr. Abhyankar observes.
He points out that the Welfare Act provided that the administrative expenditure should not exceed 5% of the expenditure incurred on welfare, a fact which is often misconstrued in its application.
Mr. Abhyankar says a number of other factors complicate the issue of workers not registering with the labour office.
“Typically, the contractor or the labour supplier gives a group of labourers, who hail from other States, an advance. This is advantageous for the workers to meet their expenses in a new city while it ensures that they are obligated to that particular builder for the duration of their service. Furthermore, the extremely slipshod implementation of laws put no onus of registering the labour force on the builders,” he says, adding that in some cases, lack of Aadhaar cards had dissuaded the worker from registering with the labour board.
Mr. Abhyankar further points out that it is ultimately to the builder’s detriment if they failed to get the workers registered.
He said that the Construction Workers’ Welfare Cess Act, that was enacted by the Parliament in 1996 and was designed to provide workers protection, had imposed a cess at the rate of 1% on the construction cost incurred by the builders on every new project. Maharashtra had approved of this act in 2007.