Dr Drabu for incentivizing JK's skilled labour

FM chairs meeting of State Advisory Board for Revision of Minimum Wages

SRINAGAR, JULY 19:  Minister for Finance, Dr Haseeb Drabu today said the revision of minimum wages for the scheduled employments should be effected in accordance with the skills, inflation and other economic factors.

"There should be reasonable hike for all labor classes in accordance with the inflation and other economic factors," Dr Drabu said while chairing a meeting of the State Advisory Board for Revision of Minimum Wages.

He said the skilled labor should be incentivized and the grounds for hike in the wages should be based on Consumer Price Index (CPI).

The meeting was convened to take a call on revision of minimum rates of wages for scheduled employments.

The Finance Minister said the revision in rates should improve the quality of life of different categories of workers. He directed the officers to conduct a comparative study on 'Minimum Wages' offered by J&K with the other states in the country and come up with a proposal within a week. 

"The motive of revising the rates is to enhance the quality of life of workers and also to motivate unskilled labor to graduate to the skilled labor. However, the grounds for revision must be based on inflationary and other trends of modernity and the revised rates must not remain confined to papers only," Dr Drabu said.  

The meeting was also attended by Commissioner Secretary Finance, Navin K Choudhary, Labour Commissioner, Dr Abdul Rashid, Special Secretary, PWD, Asif Khan, Director, Finance, PWD, G M Khan and representatives of KCCI, FAK, BMS, CITU and other trade bodies.

The Finance Minister sought details from the officers of the concerned departments regarding the status of implementation of current 'Minimum Wages' Act. "The employer must provide insurance for high risk labor working at dams and other perilous sites," he said..

Representatives of Federation of Industries, Bari Brahmana Jammu, Boiler Mazdoor Association SKIMS and Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh Jammu and Kashmir gave suggestions regarding the revision of the 'Minimum Wages'.