State governments and union territories have collected Rs 33,602.61 crore as cess for the welfare of construction workers, of which only Rs 7,601.38 crore had been spent as on June 30, 2017, the Government has informed Parliament.
“The balance amount of cess lying with the state governments/ UTs is approximately Rs 26,001.23 crore,” Labour and Employment Minister Bandaru Dattatreya said in a written reply.
To ensure proper utilisation of this huge corpus, the Centre had set up a Monitoring Committee on September 9, 2015, under the chairmanship of the Secretary, Labour Ministry, the Minister said, adding that it has been “holding regular meetings.”
Under the Building and Other Construction Workers' (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996, a one per cent cess is levied on the cost of construction incurred by employers or developers to create a fund for workers in case of accidents, old age pension, loans and medical expenses. The responsibility of registering the workers, collecting cess and its utilisation lies with the state governments and state workers' welfare boards.
Labour law violations
The number of labour law violations have decreased in the past two years, the Labour Minister informed Parliament on Monday.
“In 2015-2016, the number of irregularities detected in compliance with various labour laws was 241,796 and in 2016-2017, the number of irregularities detected in compliance of various labour laws was 221,252,” according to data available from the office of the Chief Labour Commissioner (Central).
In a written reply in the Lok Sabha, Dattatreya said the number of inspections had increased to 36,067 in 2016-2017 as compared to 29,770 in 2015-2016. The number of prosecutions launched against the violations has also increased from 5,751 in 2015-2016 to 6,691 in 2016- 2017, he added.
However, the number of inspections in some spheres has declined, according to official data. Under the Contract Labour Act, inspections fell to 8,843 in 20116-17, against 10,593 in 2015-16. Under the Construction Workers' Act, inspections fell to 1,372 in 2016-17, against 2,086 in 2015-16, while inspections conducted under the Minimum Wages Act declined to 9,151 in 2016-17, against 9,803 in 2015-16.