Hyderabad: Union minister for labour and employment Bandaru Dattetreya on Saturday said the Centre will introduce three important Amendment Bills pertaining to his ministry in the Parliament session set to commence from July 18.
The Amendment Bills are in Child Labour (Prohibition & Regulation) Act, 1986, Maternity Benefit Act, 1961 and The Employees Compensation Act, 1923.
Addressing the media here, Mr Dattatreya said that the NDA government was giving utmost importance to employment generation in rural areas and has released '1,824 crore to TS towards 90 per cent of Centre's share in 2015-16. He urged the TS government to utilise the funds for creation of productive assets.
Mr Dattatreya stated that EPFO would be restructured soon by creating 21 zones against the 10 at present. Promotions of employees, extension of EPFO services, reduction of employees’ strength in the organisation from the existing 20 to 10 for EPFO eligibility, bringing rural, semi-urban, unorganised, contract workers into the fold of EPFO social security resulting in increase of PF subscribers from existing 6 crore to about 9 crore in the country etc are among the initiatives that will be implemented soon.
He said that an amendment to the EPF Act in Parliament was also being proposed and has been referred to the Cabinet for approval. Mr Dattatreya said that speedy settlement of claims is on the top of EPFO agenda.
He said that due to Direct Benefit Transfer Scheme, the Centre could save up to 35 per cent of funds by checking irregularities in welfare schemes. He said that the Centre sanctioned '580 crore to 8,695 gram panchyats in TS, each gram panchayat getting an average of '6.6 lakh directly.
Mr Dattatreya said the Centre was actively considering the creation of Turmeric Park in Armoor in Nizambad district, Mirchi Parks in Warangal and Khammam and Cheneta (handloom) Parks in Gadwal and Pochampally. A Central team was expected to visit Armoor soon to finalise setting up of the Turmeric Park, he said.
