Dushyant Chautala Amid fear in the industry over 75 per cent reservation to locals in private jobs in Haryana, Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala Sunday said the state government is open to suggestions from industry bodies before framing rules to implement the quota law.
Talking to mediapersons here, Dushyant said the first meeting to frame the rules will be held on Monday.
“It will be our endeavour to frame the rules by the end of this month. Next month, we will run employment drives in all 22 districts and 67 employment exchanges in the state,” Chautala, who holds the industries portfolio, said.
Responding to criticism from various quarters, including some members of the industry, he alleged that many people have “misconception” about the law and pointed out that Haryana was not the only state where such a provision had been made. “Many people want to spread confusion. You talk about Article 16 of the Constitution but that is limited to only government jobs. For non-government jobs, Maharashtra had introduced a law to give 80 per cent reservation to Marathi-speaking people more than three decades back. After that, eight different states have adopted this law,” said Dushyant.
Governor S N Arya had last week given his assent to the Haryana State Employment of Local Candidates Act, 2021, passed by the Vidhan Sabha clearing the way for a 75 per cent quota in the private sector for job seekers from Haryana. The Act will remain in force across the state for a period of at least 10 years. The Act will apply to all the companies, societies, trusts, limited liability partnership firms, partnership firms and any person employing 10 or more persons and an entity as may be notified by the government from time to time. A cross-section of the industry representatives had expressed apprehensions that the move will “potentially slow the post-Covid economic recovery, increase compliance burden and usher in an inspector raj”.
However, Dushyant said the law was necessary to give employment to educated youths of the state in the prevailing condition of the employment while calling the Governor’s assent to the Bill as “historic”.
He said the state government held eight rounds of meeting with industry associations before this law was made “and even now we will hold consultations with them”.
“After consultations, if we have to incorporate some technical things in the rules, will do that so that industry comes to our state in an even bigger way,” the deputy chief minister said.
“Earlier too we had sought suggestions from them. We will now seek suggestions from industry associations of our state and chambers of industry bodies. We will write to them with copies of the bill and seek suggestions for framing the rules,” he added.
In reply to a question, he said Haryana remains a favourite destination for the industry and added that a leading lithium battery manufacturing company was setting up a plant at an investment of Rs 7,500 crore. “Top companies, including Amazon, are ready to invest in Haryana,” he said.
Hitting out at the opposition, he said not even one factory has moved out of the state even during the coronavirus pandemic.
Asked why a section of the industry was opposing the state government’s reservation move, the deputy chief minister said, “If there are objections, observations of industry, we will hold consultations and resolve it. That is the job of the state government.”