However, the government has enacted an important change to the fixed-term employment framework that may help companies in handing out contractual jobs to its existing permanent workforce.
The move will help industries in pushing authorities for exemption under various labour laws at a micro-level, along with demanding changes to bring greater flexibility in their operations related to retrenchment, safety standards, and collective bargaining.
If retrenched workers are unable to reskill within a fixed period of time, they will have to return the money given to them by the government. Moreover, they may be asked to pay back an interest on the sum transferred.
Ensuring health insurance for all workers would be major challenge for the industry that is already grappling with cash crunch, and the government should have borne the cost.
Battered by the Covid-19 pandemic, the maker of the Fortuner and Innova models is staring at a steep loss in the ongoing financial year.
The Bill states a worker will be paid twice his or her wage if he or she is allowed to work overtime. A majority of workers in India worked more than 48 hours in a week, which is higher than the International Labour Organisation's prescribed time-limit.
There was no announcement from the government on guaranteeing a minimum basic income, which is the need of the hour. The announcements on portability of ration cards and affordable rental housing to workers are for the long and medium terms. Migrant workers need immediate relief.
Experts say, these leave many matters to the discretionary powers of bureaucrats, rather than providing them explicitly in the rules.
This crisis has arisen just as demand in India's auto sector started seeing some sort of revival after the nationwide lockdown in March/April.
While some trade union leaders have welcomed the move, industry has opposed it, fearing an increase in its wage bill
The Centre has, however, retained its proposal to curb flash strikes as workers in all factories will be required to give employers a strike notice of at least two weeks after the Bill becomes a law.
For states like West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh, where migration is high, the return of workers could be as much an opportunity as a liability. All states have launched portals to register migrant workers; additional fields like nature of employment and remuneration in the past 2-3 years are being added to help in skill mapping.
Employers' refusal to recognise TUs has caused industrial tiffs.
The company stated that it was taking steps for cost rationalisation across all businesses to maintain liquidity and due to a prolonged slowdown it had to take a few tough measures.
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