New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government plans to get migrant labourers to enrol themselves under the proposed national database of unorganised sector workers by offering a one-year waiver of the annual premium on insurance cover under the PM Suraksha Bima Yojana, ThePrint has learnt.
The Union Ministry of Labour and Employment, which is developing the national database, has proposed a waiver of the annual Rs 12 premium on its Rs 2 lakh accidental insurance cover scheme — PM Suraksha Bima Yojana — for one year for workers who enrol themselves under the portal.
“This is a kind of an incentive to ensure that unorganised sector workers, including migrant workers, join the national database portal of the unorganised workers,” a labour ministry official, who did not want to be named, told ThePrint.
The National Informatics Centre under the information technology ministry is developing the portal. IT ministry officials say work on the portal is at an advanced stage and they expect it to take off by July. It is likely to be launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
How workers can register themselves
After the launch of the database, workers in the unorganised sector, including migrant workers, will have to self-register themselves and provide information such as name, occupation, address, type of occupation, educational qualification, skills, family details etc.
This will not only allow for optimum realisation of their employability but also help extend the benefits of the social security schemes to them, labour ministry officials involved in developing the database said.
Migrant workers can register through their mobile phones. The workers who do not have a phone or do not know how to read/write, can go to the nearest common service centre and get themselves registered, where a registration card with a Unique Account Number of the worker will be generated.
The database of the unorganised and migrant workers will be seeded with Aadhaar. “The workers will be able to find out about all the welfare schemes targeting unorganised sector and migrant workers and can apply for them online. They can also register their complaints on the portal,” said a second official in the labour ministry.
The estimated cost of the project is around Rs 704.01 crore, Union Labour Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar informed the Lok Sabha on 22 March.
Also read: This 2008 law could have given migrants safety net for lockdown, but was never implemented
Why the national database?
The Modi government had proposed to set up a national database for unorganised sector workers following the migrant crisis that unfolded when the Centre had announced a nationwide lockdown in March last year to control the spread of the coronavirus.
Thousands of migrant workers lost their livelihood and were left without food or shelter. The Centre then announced a slew of welfare schemes, including free ration and transfer of cash to those workers who were hit the hardest.
But despite the Centre’s initiative, many migrant workers were deprived of the benefits. The Centre had told Parliament it did not have data about deaths and job loss of migrant workers in the absence of a database.
The Centre then announced its decision to set up a national portal that will have details of all unorganised and migrant workers in the country.
Labour ministry officials said the portal will eventually be linked to different ministries for delivery of services. The ministries will be able to transfer benefits directly to the migrant workers’ accounts.
According to ministry officials, there are approximately 38 crore workers in the unorganised sector in India, including around 2-3 crore migrant workers.
(Edited by Neha Mahajan)
Also read: Directly employed, self-employed also ‘migrant workers’ under Modi govt’s new definition