Protecting gig workers

Union Minister for Labour and Employment Mansukh Mandaviya recently reiterated the government's commitment to extending social-security benefits to gig and platform workers.

He underscored the government's active exploration of various approaches to ensure that these workers were brought under social-security schemes, akin to those available to traditional employees. In this regard, companies and aggregators employing gig and platform workers would be encouraged to lead the registration process of their workers on the eShram portal, which serves as a national database for unorganised workers.

This initiative will be in line with the four new Labour Codes, introduced by the Union government in 2020 that are still awaiting implementation. Among these, the Code on Social Security, 2020, is particularly significant because it consolidates nine labour laws related to social security into a single, integrated code, aiming to extend coverage to workers across both the organised and unorganised sectors. While the Code sets out mandatory benefits for traditional employees, it only provides the central government with guidelines to formulate and announce welfare and social-security schemes specifically for gig and platform workers.