Bogus system of work contracts in hospitals, claims petition in HC

A petition being heard in the Bombay High Court has claimed the existence of a "sham and bogus" sub-contract system of allocating labour work in several hospitals in the city, concealing a permanent form of employment.

The petition was filed by a group of workers carrying out works of plumbing, carpentry, masonry and other such similar occupations in hospitals of the Employees State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) at Andheri, Kandivli, Thane and Ulhasnagar.

According to them, the ESIC has given a contract to the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) of the Union government and the National Building Construction Corporation Ltd (NBCC), which is a public sector undertaking.

Their petition contends that the CPWD and NBCC, in turn, have over years awarded "sub-contracts" to various private companies. They allege that while the companies kept changing over time, the workers remained the same in each work.

The petition claims that some workers have been employed in this manner since as far back as 1989.

"This so-called contract labour system is in fact sham and bogus and is a camouflage projected to hide the true master-servant relationship of the principal employer and the workmen and to deprive the workmen of their rightful status as direct and permanent employees and wages and benefits consequent upon the same," it says.

The Contract Laghu Udyog Kamgar Union filed the petition through lawyer Jane Cox.

The workmen demand that they should be absorbed as permanent workers and that their dispute should be referred to the Industrial Tribunal for adjudication.

They also claim that several sub-contractors are "not even licensed by the government and yet they have been granted sub-contracts in hospitals where the poorest workers of our society and their families are treated."

However, ESIC counsel J P Cama says, "The ESIC has not issued the contracts but is merely a financing agency. Since the corporation is not in the construction business, it had given the contracts to various private contractors."

... contd.

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