Prez returns minimum wages amendment Bill

The Bill was returned once before and was sent back with changes

President Pranab Mukherjee has returned the Minimum Wages (Delhi) amendment Bill 2015 that stipulates steep penalty for violating labour laws in the national Capital, to the Delhi Assembly.

Speaker Ram Niwas Goel said on Thursday that the Bill, that was cleared by the Assembly in December 2015, has been returned for “reconsideration”.

Incidentally, it was returned once before and was sent back to the President with the required changes, Labour minister Gopal Rai said.

“We have received a letter from the Lieutenant Governor (Anil Baijal) dated March 8 in which he has apprised me that the President has returned the Minimum Wages (Delhi) Amendment Bill 2015 for reconsideration,” Goel told the House.

The proposed law has recommended imprisonment of up to three years and penalty amounting Rs 50,000 for violators of the Minimum Wages Act.

Under the proposed amendments, companies will also have to upload the data of their employees on their websites in the manner as may be prescribed by the Delhi government.

“The financial condition of the labourers in Delhi is quite bad. Keeping this in mind, minimum wages have been hiked recently. But the biggest problem has been violation of law and the lack of options to penalise violators.

“The returning of the Bill is unfortunate. We will sit with the Chief Minister and work out the details and resend it,” Rai said.

In the amendment Bill, the penalty for violating the law was increased from the existing Rs 500 to Rs 50,000 and minimum imprisonment of six months was increased to three years.

Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal on Friday had approved the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government’s proposal to hike minimum wages for labourers by around 37 per cent.

Now, unskilled persons Delhi labourers will get minimum wages of Rs 13,350 per month against the existing Rs 9,724 per month. For semiskilled and skilled persons, it will increase from Rs 10,764 to Rs 14,698 and from Rs 11,830 to Rs 16,182 per month respectively.