RS. 1344.10 Lakh released for Jammu and Kashmir drinking water project

February 4, 2002

Malayali baggs prestigious Shram Award from the Prime Minister

More labour reforms to support private Industry

keralamonitor.com

The most prestigious Shram Award, the Shram Ratna has been conferred on Raghavan Pillai Parameswaran Nair of Korba Super Thermal Power Station (NTPC),. Korba (M.P.). It carries a cash award of Rs. two lakh and a `Sanad’.

The Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has said that all stakeholders would be consulted in changing archaic labour laws. Speaking at a function after presenting Shram Awards here today, Shri Vajpayee called for a debate with an open mind on labour laws and stressed the need for supporting necessary changes in them to make Indian industry and services more competitive. He called upon the trade unions to look at the issue in its entirety.

Dispelling their fears the Prime Minister said that labour reforms are not anti-worker. He said that the Government would abide by its responsibility to protect the interest of workers. Shri Vajpayee expressed the hope that the Second National Labour Commission will give its report soon. He said that the Government would seriously consider its recommendations. Referring to public sector undertaking Shri Vajpayee said that they are the pillars of economy and Government policy is to close only those units that cannot be revived. The Prime Minister said that we are in competitive age and have to create a better place for Indian goods in world markets by way of improved quality and productivity. He said that we would not follow globalisation blindly but devise our own standards that shall meet our needs and aspirations. He said that creation of jobs is the biggest challenge facing us.

Earlier felicitating the Award Winners, the Labour Minister Shri Sharad Yadav called for providing a greater thrust and a higher investment in skill development and training of workers. He said only 5% of the labour force in the age group of 20-24 years in the country has vocational skills. As such no initiative for generation of better quality employment can succeed without skill up-gradation of this huge segment of workers, he added. Referring to labour reforms, Shri Yadav disclosed that the 52 years old Factories Act and the Mines Act, 1948 are being amended while action has been initiated to bring about changes in various other labour laws for promoting efficiency and productivity and mining more safe.

The Labour Minister said that the government is very sensitive to the social security needs, safety occupational health requirements of the workers. Shri Yadav said it is proposed to provide pensionery and insurance benefits only to workers of small units in view of the financial capabilities of employers and workers in such units. This will reduce the financial cost of participation to half of the present cost of 25.5% and benefit a large number of workers in small units. He also disclosed that the Labour Ministry proposes to make suitable modifications in the social security frame work in order to enroll contractualized labour and job work employees through contribution of persons delivering contractualizing goods in service.

In his Welcome Address the Minister of State for Labour Muni Lall expressed hope that the workers that the managements, workers and trade unions will come together to evolve a new work culture for meeting a global competition by the Indian industry.

The Labour Secretary Shri Vinod Vaish said that the framework include workers from the private sector for consideration for Shram Awards in an advanced stage. This is being done on the direction of the Prime Minister.

28 workers employed in the Departmental and Public Sector Undertakings of the Central and State Governments were honoured with 17 Shram Awards for the year 2000 by the Prime Minister in recognition of their distinguished performance, innovative abilities, outstanding contribution in the field of productivity and exhibition of exceptional courage and presence of mind.

The most prestigious Shram Award, the Shram Ratna has been conferred on Shri Raghavan Pillai Parameswaran Nair of Korba Super Thermal Power Station (NTPC),. Korba (M.P.). It carries a cash award of Rs. two lakh and a `Sanad’.

The two Shram Bushan Awards have been conferred on five workers. One of the Shram Bhushan awards has been given to Shri Asis Bhattacharyya of Rifle Factory, Ishapore (W.B.). The other Award has been jointly shared by a team comprising S/Shri A. Ramesh Babu, N.P. Monappa, K. Shivadas and T. Ramachandra of Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd., Bangalore. Each Shram Bhushan Award carries a cash award of Rs.one lakh and a `Sanad’.

Six Shram Vir Awards carrying a cash award of Rs.60,000/- and a `Sanad’ each are shared by ten workers. While five of the Shram Vir Awards have been conferred individually, one award has been shared by five workers. The team sharing one of the Shram Vir awards consists of S/Shri Chajju Ram, Anchal Singh, Rattan Lal, Nidhia Ram and Bhagwan Das of Jammu, Banikhet and Jallandhar units of Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd. Those who have individually bagged the Shram Vir Awards are Shri Nisar Ahmed Mohammed Siddique Shaikh of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Mumbai ; Shri Ananta Kumar Nath of Rifle Factory, Ishapore ; Shri J.S. William of Bhilai Steel Plant, Bhilai ; Shri Pankaj Kumar Sen of Chittaranjan Locomotic Works, Chittaranjan (W.B.) and Shri Satya Pal Singh of Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd., Hardwar.

Eight Shram Shri and Shram Devi Awards, each carrying a cash award of Rs.40,000/- and a `Sanad’ have been given to twelve workers. Three Shram Devi Awards winners are Smt. Deveeramma of HMT Ltd. ,Banglore, Smt. Madhuri Singh of ITI Ltd., Mankapur (Gonda) and Smt. Potluri Rajani of Defence Research and Development Laboratory, Hyderabad. One of the Shram Shri Awards has been shared jointly by a team comprising of S/Shri Kunchunni Achari Viswanathan, Karuppa Samy Selvakumar, Thandavarayan Ramalingam , Parameswaran Sasidharan Nair and Chellappan Pillai (Jointly) of CVRDE, Awadi, Chnnai . The remaining four Shram Shri Awards have been individually won by Shri A.K. Vijayaraghavan of Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd., Banglore ; Shri Dineshwar Upadhyay of Chittaranjan Locomotive Works, Chittaranjan ; Shri Ashok Kumar Atri of 505, Army Base Workshop , Delhi Cantt. and Shri Ramesh Prasad Singh of Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. Barauni Oil Refinery, Begusarai.

 

RS. 1344.10 Lakh released for Jammu and Kashmir drinking water project

The Ministry of Rural Development has released an amount of Rs.1344.10 lakh to Jammu and Kashmir towards second instalment of funds out of the total allocation of Rs.9896 lakh under the Rajiv Gandhi National Drinking Water Mission (RGNDWM) – Centrally sponsored Accelerated Rural Water Supply Programme (ARWSP), during the year 2001-2002.

The Ministry has also released a total amount of Rs.19.96 lakh to three districts of Jammu and Kashmir under National Old Age Pension Scheme (NOAPS) during the current financial year. The districts Kargil - Rs.3.16 lakh and Punch - Rs.10.69 lakh gets both the first and second instalments of funds, whereas, Doda district gets Rs.6.11 lakh as second instalment.

Rs. 3.44 lakh has been released the both first and second instalments of funds to two districts of the State under National Family Benefit Scheme (NFBS). These districts are – Kargil Rs.0.42 lakh and Punch Rs.3.02 lakh.