National Social Security Board constituted under the Unorganized Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008 held its first meeting on 23rd September, 2009. Union Minister of Labour and Employment, Shri Mallikarjun Kharge preceded as the chair person.
Expressing concern about the problems being faced by the unorganized sector workers, the Minister cited enactment of the legislation as a major step towards providing social security to the unorganized workers in the country. He stated that social security which was accessible only to certain segments of unorganized sector workers will now also cover that 94% of our workforce which is in the unorganized sector.
He pointed out that the enactment of ‘the Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008’ was only a beginning and it would be government’s endeavour to extend the benefits to certain segments of the unorganized workers who are above poverty line (APL) as well. He said that the States have already been advised to extend the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) to other construction workers and efforts have even been initialized to extend the RSBY to NREGS beneficiaries also.