Bengaluru: The state government’s Bill to provide social security and protection to gig workers is most likely to be tabled in the forthcoming monsoon session.
Speaking to DH after a consultation meeting with various stakeholders here, Labour Minister Santosh Lad said, “We will hold another two rounds of meetings with the stakeholders as some aggregators feel that the proposed cess must be charged on the basis on each transaction while others feel that it must be charged on the basis of the company’s total turnover. We need to arrive at a consensus on this matter,” he said.
“All other issues, such as the formation of the welfare board and related issues, have been sorted out,” he added.
The proposed Bill aims to establish a fund through the Gig and Platform Workers Welfare Board to provide social security and protection to gig workers, in line with Rajasthan’s Gig workers Law.
Sources in the Labour Department conceded that most of the aggregators, particularly the ride-sharing aggregators, such as Ola, Uber, Flipkart, Zomato, Dunzo, FreshOn and Zepto, are against the government’s idea of fixing the cess based on company’s turnover as they want it on the basis of “transaction” so that the cost could effectively be transferred to customer.
“Argument of the ride-sharing aggregators is that their turnover on paper might appear to be huge but in reality, it is way less than what it is... For instance, Ola or Uber would transfer most of its revenue to drivers on a day-to-day basis. Therefore, they don’t want the cess to calculated on the basis of turnover. Instead, they want it to be calculated on the basis of transactions, so that they can pass it on to customer directly,” the source explained.
Meanwhile, Principal Secretary (Labour) Mohammed Mohsin told DH that the draft Bill is almost in its final stages as the department would now seek a finance department nod to fix the government’s share to contribute to the welfare of the gig workers.
“Almost all stakeholders have agreed to contribute and the government need to fill the small shortfall to create robust welfare system for the gig workers,” he said.
The department would soon hold a meeting with the Finance Department in this regard before finalizing its share. “We are planning to table this Bill in the coming monsoon session,” he said.