Make labour cess collection hassle free: CS to officials

Chief secretary Rajendra Kumar Tiwari on Friday directed officials to make the process of collection of labour cess simple, quick and easy.

Presiding over a meeting with regard to the complaints related to labour cess, he said, any notice related to collection of cess wrongly issued to anyone must be disposed of quickly.

It was informed in the meeting that under code on social security, 2020, Rs 50 lakh was provisioned for raising the exemption limit of up to Rs 10 lakh in respect of private residential buildings under cess collection.

“For the Act to be effective, the government has been given the power to increase the minimum number of workers to be employed at the construction site by 10. In order to facilitate the cess assessment, a system of self-certification has been provided. The rules under the code are in the promulgation process, in which it is also proposed to accept the evaluation issued by the chartered engineer and chartered evaluator,” it was pointed out.

The chief secretary said that in order to make the process of collecting the labour cess simple and convenient, all the district collectors should be able to get the district level and divisional commissioner at divisional level officers of 15 other departments in the context of government construction, all the additional/deputy/assistant labour commissioners for personal construction work in their respective local jurisdiction.

“Cess assessors and receptors are notified through which instructions have been given to ensure settlement of area disputes, building and other construction disputes on priority,” the CS was informed.

Additional chief secretary, labour, Suresh Chandra and senior officials of other related departments were among others present in the meeting.