Employment exchanges will soon be renamed ‘Employment Guidance and Promotion Centres’ with a focus on vocational guidance and career counselling, besides registration, submission and placements.

Also, it will be mandatory for private sector establishments employing between 10-24 persons to submit employment and occupational returns.

These amendments to the Employment Exchanges (Compulsory Notification of Vacancies) Act, 1959, were approved by the Union Cabinet on Thursday.

“This is likely to result in a more realistic estimate of employment in the organised sector” the Labour Ministry said in a release on Thursday.

Once these amendments are made, employers will be mandated to furnish information relating to the result of selection against the vacancies notified within 30 days of the date of selection to make the registration data more rational, the Ministry said.

Earlier, medium, small and micro enterprises had objected to this proposal. However, brushing these aside, the Government has said that in line with the 3rd Census of Small Scale Industries 2001-2002, the number of establishments/enterprises employing  10-24 workers was less than 1 per cent.

“More than 99 per cent of the establishments continue to be exempted, and, therefore, the burden would not increase on the employers and establishments employing 10-24 workers who would be required to furnish returns,” it said.

The definitions of employee and employer would also be broad-based to include contract labour that has worked for more than 240 days in a year.

The Government also proposes to include plantation establishments owned and managed by a company under the Act, but such establishments owned and run by individuals would continue to be exempted.

As of now, the data collected under Act gives employment and occupational details of employees in establishments at regular intervals. Once employment exchanges are modernised under the proposed

Mission Mode Project, this data will be available online on a real-time basis. “It will give an idea to planners and policy makers to reorient the training and skill development system of the country keeping in view the skill requirement of future,” the Ministry said.

aditi.n@theindu.co.in

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