Hyderabad: Union Minister for State for Labour and Employment Bandaru Dattatreya, on Friday, said that the Provident Fund Organisation would come up with a 200-bedded hospital in Boyiguda in city and the existing hospital in Warangal would be upgraded into a 100-bedded hospital.

Speaking at a review meeting at the Regional Employee Provident Fund Office, the Minister said as part of upgrading the health care facilities to the workers, the existing facility in Ramagundam would be upgraded into a 300-bedded hospital. Similarly, a 100-bedded hospital would come up in Pydibhimavaram in Andhra Pradesh.

He said healthcare, employee provident fund and employment training skills to the youth were on the top of the agenda of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government at the Centre. To realise this agenda, the department has come up with an action plan to bring the major industries in the public and private sectors in the country to one place to provide apprentice training, to boost the employment opportunities to the youth.

Even the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) would be brought under this cover. For this, an action plan has been prepared to start model Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs), where unemployed youth would be provided vocational training. Along this programme, the existing Central employment exchanges would identify the requirements of skill sets needed by various industries and enterprises, both in public and private sector. The exchanges, in turn, would place the trained youth from the ITIs in various industries on apprenticeship, as well employment opportunities, he said.

Dattatreya said the ministry had launched the ‘Srama Suvidha’ portal to utilise the information technology for transparent and effective delivery system to extend the services of the departments under it. As part of this, all the 16 labour laws governing were made available in the public domain to create awareness. Also, a unique identification number has been created even for the migrant building construction workers and on the basis of this unique identification services meant for the welfare of the workers could be used anywhere in the country, he said.

Further, besides enhancing the minimum pension from Rs 30 to Rs 1,000, now the maximum relief of pension has been pegged at Rs 7,500. Also, the employee deposit linked insurance has been hiked from the existing Rs 1.3 lakh to Rs 3.6 lakh, he informed. Economic Advisor to the ministry Subba Rao, Regional Provident Fund Additional Commissioner Sarveswaran and Regional Director C Bose took part in the review meeting.

Source: HI