Help them…Who Help us : Labor Welfare

Labor welfare may be viewed as a total concept, as a social concept and as a relative concept. Therefore, this implies that a human being needs the setting up of minimum desirable facilities like health, food, clothing, housing, medical assistance, insurance, job security, recreation etc. Labor Welfare also operates, to neutralize the harmful effects of large-scale industrialization and urbanization.

Need for Labor Welfare
Labors help to dig and haul coal from the bowels of the earth, to fetch and refine oil, to build dams and reservation, to lay pipes, canals, lines and roads etc. The wheel of the life, the whole society moves only due to the labor of the workers. If the workers withdraw themselves from the areas in which they are engaged, the movement of the entire society will come to a halt and it would plunge back into the barbaric state in which average life was poor, pasty and brutish. Unless, the workers are maintained in good and healthy conditions and kept in good humor they can't work productively and efficiently.

The maintenance of the welfare of the workers in all aspects for the development of the society is the raison d’etre of labor welfare philosophy and programs.

Labor Welfare in India
In a developing country like India, people expect much from their own government. Till the end of British rule, the Government was concerned only with its primary duties like maintenance of law and order. With the advent of independence, the idea of police state has been replaced by the welfare state. In conformity with the objectives in the Constitution, it is incumbent upon the state to strive for securing to all its citizens, social, justice, economic and political expression, liberty of thought, belief, faith and worship, equality of status and of opportunity and for promoting among them all fraternity, which ensures the individual’s dignity and nation’s unity.

Labor Law
Labor Law is not one legislation. Among the plethora of labor Laws, the significant ones are:-

I.Apprentices Act, 1961: It regulates and controls the training of apprentices in designated trades, and availability of trained technical personnel for the industry.

II. Employees provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act,1952:
This has instituted a compulsory contributory fund for the future of the employee after his retirement or for his/her dependants in his/her early death.

III. Employees’ State Insurance act, 1948: It provides to the workers medical relief, sickness cash benefits, maternity benefits to women workers, pension to the dependant of deceased workers and compensation for fatal and other employment injuries including occupational diseases.

IV. Child Labor (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986: This prohibits the engagement of children in certain occupations and systems, which are proved to be harmful and not safe for child labors and also decides under which conditions child will work in certain other employment.

At the end of entire topic, the bottom line is that there are several laws for labor welfare. But the question is that how much we are concerned about those labors that are helping us in many ways. Are we enough focused to implement the law to come to an act? Are we spreading our helping hands to hold those hands that are always in action to satisfy our need of the life?