Govt considering proposal to hike minimum salary of daily wagers: Min

“The (labour) unions are demanding that it (the minimum salary of daily wage workers) should be between Rs 16,000 and 18,000. We are considering the proposal,” said the Minister of State for Labour and Employment.

Dattatreya was speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of the Consultative Committee attached to his Ministry.

“The state government is an appellate authority to decide on the minimum wages but at the same time, following consistent demand from the labour unions, the Ministry wants to amend the statutory minimum wages for the country that is universal wages,” he added.

Dattatreya said the government’s main aim is to give proper job, wages and social security to the workers and the Ministry is working towards it.

He said the Centre is focusing on providing social security to unorganised workers. “In all, 93 per cent of the unorganised workers have no social security, no proper enforcement of labour laws. We need to protect them,” he said, adding that the social security cover would be provided in three phases.

 “In the first phase, construction workers would be covered by bringing them under the purview of formal sector giving benefit of provident fund (PF), ESI and others,” he added.