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IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
CIVIL ORIGINAL JURISDICTION
WRIT PETITION (CIVIL) No. ______ OF 2006
IN THE MATTER OF: - |
NATIONAL CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE FOR CENTRAL
LEGISLATION ON CONSTRUCTION LABOUR (NCC-CL)
THROUGH ITS CO-ORDINATOR,
SUBASH BHATNAGAR,
B-19, SUBHAVANA NIKETAN,
PRITAM PURA, |
| DELHI-34. |
…PETITIONER |
| VERSUS |
| 38. |
The State of Tamil Nadu has adopted a scheme under the Tamil Nadu Manual Workers Act 1982 instead of the said Main Act. The Main Act applies only to establishments which employed or had employed on any day of the proceeding twelve months ten or more building workers in any building and other construction work, but Section 1 (4) of the Tamil Nadu scheme has no such employment limit and applies to all establishments where the construction workers are employed. Whereas the Tamil Nadu Act, has provisions for regulation of employment, the said Central Act does not have such provisions. While the Cess under the Central Cess Act is 1% (up to a maximum of 2%) of the cost of the project, it is only 0.3% under the Tamil Nadu Scheme, which is a major variation of the State from the Main Act. Section 16 of the provision seeks for contribution to be made by the worker to the fund, the Tamil Nadu Scheme as it operates now does not call for any contribution to be made by or collected from the workers. It is submitted that there is no uniformity in the Acts and rules framed by different States with that of other States/ Union Territories. |
| 39. |
In Delhi although the Board was formed in September 2002, the registration of the workers started in November 2005 roughly 300 workers have been registered and only Rs. 25 crores has been collected as cess as against the estimated 100 crores, which is low and less than 1%. Further the cess should have been collected from 19th August 1996. One of the major problems faced is who should be the collecting and assessing the cess especially when there are three authorities like in Delhi, which has, M.C.D, N.D.M.C, Delhi Cantonment as the sanctioning authorities of buildings. |
| 40. |
In Kerala Cess is being collected by the Labour Department, while under the law; cess is to be collected by the Local Authority (Sec 3 and Rule 4 & 5 of Cess Act). Since the Labour Department cannot utilize the amount and the amount is to be utilized by the Board they are not interested in collecting the cess and the labour Department is overburdened. One of the arguments of the board is that there is not enough money and staff to handle the functions and duties under both Acts. It is submitted that in Delhi the registration of Construction Workers as ‘beneficiaries’ has been outsourced to the Citizens Service Bureau of MCD, which has handed over it’s Citizen Service Bureau to the Electronic Cooperation of India Limited (ECIL) who in turn had passed on the C.S.B - MCD work to SARK, which collects Rs 7/- per transaction and Rs 12/- if per transaction is more than Rs. 500/- hence the money so collected for the welfare of the workers will have a substantial deductions if the above transaction charges are applied, since the contribution of the worker towards the Board is to be collected quarterly at the rate of Rs 20/ per month. If five lakhs workers are registered then the Board will have to pay Rs 14 million per year for two million transactions. |
| 41. |
In Gujarat the rules have been notified while the board was formed in January 2005, which consists of one person, registration of the workers and establishments and the collection of Cess has started very recently. In Madhya Pradesh the implementation of both the acts has been done. In Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Expert Committee was formed but the rules have not been notified. Rests of the States have not taken steps for the implementation of 1996 Acts of Construction Workers in their states. |
| 42. |
Chapter -III of the main Act provides for a Central Advisory Committee (CAC) although it functions are not given in the Acts or Rules, it is clear from the proceedings of four meetings held so far that one of the main function of CAC is to monitor the |
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