Workforce in unorganised sector to get social security number

CHANDIGARH: Centre would review labour laws to provide adequate protection to 92 per cent workers in the unorganised sector and was also planning to provide social security card or social security number to such workers, Union Labour Minister Sahib Singh Verma said.
"In our country, out of a total workforce of about 400 million only around eight per cent is covered under one or the other social security schemes whereas 92 per cent of workers were without any social protection", Singh said.
"It is this vast majority of nearly 37 crore in the unorganised sector who need social protection and there is a need to rationalise existing labour laws," he said.
Verma said the Centre was also thinking about Social Security Protection Act for the workers in the unorganised sector. "We are discussing this with MPs and various states and will come out with something soon on this, possibly in the next budget session", he said.
Speaking after inaugurating a 50-bed model Employees State Insurance hospital here, he said this was the third such hospital to be set up in a series of 16 after the one already inaugurated at Hyderabad and Jaipur.