Madurai
About 5,000 grievances from construction workers regarding welfare schemes and registration issues among others were redressed by the district administration in the past month, Collector S. Aneesh Sekhar said, at a meeting conducted by the Tamil Nadu Construction Workers’ Welfare Board here on Saturday.
About two weeks back, a meeting to review these pending grievances was organised and works were speeded up. A week back, a review meeting was held between the leaders of the workers’ unions and the officials from different departments.
As a result, many elderly workers who had been requesting pension in the past few years were sanctioned with a monthly sum of ₹ 1,000. Also, relief funds for the families of labourers who had died due to an unfortunate accident were sanctioned.
Dr. Aneesh Sekhar said, “90 % of labourers in our nation belongs to the unorganised sector. We need to protect and empower them. Close to 17 different welfare boards are functioning in the State for such purposes. The Covid-19 pandemic has made life difficult for both workers in the organised and unorganised sectors. The International Labour Organisation has even stated that after the second world war, this is the event that has had a very bad impact on the global economy.”
Since labourers from the unorganised sectors were the most affected due to it, the government had taken many steps to help them, he added.
The Collector asked the union leaders to have interact with their members and help them get the monetary benefits that are given under the social security schemes of the government. He also promised to redress some of the grievances mentioned by the workers regarding online registration process of the welfare board soon.
