The Central Trade Unions criticised the Union Government for not doing enough for the migrant workers who are in distress. In a meeting with Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar, they urged the Centre to immediately create a National Register of Migrant Workers with identity, portability, labour law protection and social security benefits. They condemned the use of compulsion to dissuade workers from going back to their villages. They also criticised in one voice the measures such as freezing DA and delaying payment of wages.

BMS general secretary Virjesh Upadhyay and president Saji Narayanan who attended the meeting said Inter State Migrant Workers Act, 1979 is grossly violated when train fare is collected from workers, with the contractor or principal employer not providing them wages or food in the labour camps. Government should also immediately formulate a national policy on migrant workers, they demanded.

Industrial associations, trade unions, government officials and local elected representatives should collectively undertake a campaign to retain labour at the work places itself. Building confidence and trust should be top priority to start industrial work, they said and urged the Centre to adopt an India centric, swadeshi roadmap for the post-corona economic development. “FDI and E-commerce should be restricted as they will be hindrance to industrial activities coming to normalcy,” they added.

AITUC general secretary Amarjeet Kaur said the AITUC is shocked with the approach of Ministry of Labour and Employment having called a meeting with Central Trade Unions on Wednesday but not responding to any of the concerns/ issues / demands raised by them. “The ministry was on denial mode when informed that the ration and food are still not reaching all the working population. We demanded correction and improvement and to make ration distribution for universal coverage; but there was no response on the issue from the ministry,” she said. The unions also demanded the Ministry to intervene to stop decisions being taken by several States to increase working hours and wage cuts.

CITU general secretary Tapan Sen said the Centre organised such a meeting after 40 days of lockdown. “We expected that given the serious distress conditions in which workers, particularly the unorganised workers find themselves today, the Labour Ministry would call a meeting to discuss the measures required to ameliorate their distress and provide some relief to them. But, regrettably, that was not done,” he said.

He said the CTUs also expected that an Action Taken Report, detailing the measures taken by the government to ensure implementation of its own directions and advisories related to protection of the workers’ jobs and their wages will be given by the Ministry to the participants in the meeting. He said CITU itself wrote 22 letters outlining such violations – retrenchment of workers, non payment of wages related to several industries in the last 40 days.

He condemned the cancellation of trains for migrant workers from Bangalore. “The entire exercise is also a reflection of utter hypocrisy. The BJP government at the centre, after lot of pressure, has ultimately agreed to run to Shramik Special trains for return of migrant workers and after lot of bungling agreed to bear the 85 per cent cost of journey by Indian Railways. Now, the BJP Govt of Karnataka refuses to send the migrant workers back home, at the dictates of the capitalist lobby. Aren’t the reluctance and the refusal part of a single exercise?” Sen said.