The Employees State
Insurance Corporation has decided to further enhance the rates
of permanent disablement benefit and dependants benefit (family
pension) ranging from 7% to 330% in respect of disabled workers
and dependants of deceased insured persons. The decision was taken
at the 124th meeting of the Corporation chaired by
the Minister of Labour Dr. Sahib Singh here today to compensate
for the erosion in the real value of the benefit rates. The increase
varies depending upon the year in which death or disablement occurred.
This will benefit over two lakh beneficiaries who are currently
on the pay rolls of permanent disablement and death benefits of
the Corporation.
Inaugurating the
Meeting, the Chairman of the ESIC Dr. Sahib Singh said that the
existing ESI hospitals at Nachharam (Hyderabad), Jaipur, Ludhiana,
Chandigarh and Sahibabad have been taken over by the Corporation
to be run as model Hospitals . He said the proposed Model hospitals
at Asramam (Kerala), Ranchi and Phulwari Sharif (Patna) are being
taken over by the week end while those at Guwahati, Rajajinagar
(Bangalore), Kollam (Kerala) is on the cards. The Minister advised
the ESIC management to follow up the issue with the other State
Governments vigorously and seek their consent for handing over
rest of the proposed model hospitals to the Corporation by the
end of this month. The proposal of setting up of a separate wing
of Indian System of Medicine in each of the model hospitals was
also approved at today’s meeting. Dr. Sahib Singh called for more
flexibility in ESI mechanism in order to extend its coverage to
the workers in the informal sector.
The Minister of State
for Labour and Vice Chairman of the ESIC Shri Ashok Pradhan called
for organising Health Melas for workers in order to diagnose various
diseases at an early stage. He appreciated the Corporation’s decision
to set up a model hospital in each state.
The Corporation also
decided to grant notional extension of employment related accident
occurring on way from residence to place of work and vice versa
after consultations with the Ministry of Law. This will provide
relief to the hundreds of workers who get permanently disabled
or even die in road accidents in the process of commuting between
the residence and the place of work.
The proposals related
to enhancement of wage ceiling for coverage under the ESI Act
and expansion of scope of coverage by reducing the threshold in
terms of number of employees besides coverage of seasonal factories
etc. were deferred till the submission of report by the Verma
Committee. The Committee has been assigned the task of suggesting
ways and means for bringing about need based improvements in the
scheme.
The Meeting also
adopted the Annual Report for the year 2001-02. The report indicated
that as many as 5 lakh insured persons have been deprived of the
social security cover during the year 2001-02 with the crossing
of existing wage ceiling and other factors. This has brought down
total number of beneficiaries under the scheme to 310 lakh. The
Corporation’s share of expenditure on medical care was Rs.543
crore whereas the expenditure on cash benefits amounted to Rs.300
crore. The total amount outstanding against employers as arrears
of contribution had touched a new high of 748 crore by the end
of March 2002. The Corporation was able to recover about Rs.72
crore during the year on account of outstanding arrears through
its revenue recovery mechanism.
Later addressing
the media persons, the Labour Minister said that a Committee under
the Minister of State for Labour, Shri Ashok Pradhan has been
set up to monitor the functioning of the Indian System of Medicine
in ESI Hospitals. He said that all the 52 members of the ESI Corporation
have been authorised to visit ESI hospitals/dispensaries and monitor
their functioning. He said that taking a cue from the adage "prevention
is better than cure", it has been decided to set up facilities
like Yoga, Naturopathy etc. at in district parks in the capital
after taking permission from the concerned local authorities.
The representative
members of Employees and Employers, the Labour Secretary Dr. P.D.
Shenoy, Director General ESI, Smt. Asha Murthy and senior officers
of the Labour Ministry and the ESIC participated in the meeting.
