Bidar: Members of various organisations took out a rally in Bidar on Tuesday demanding job security and benefits to workers in the unorganised sector.

Protesters assembled at the Ambedkar Circle and reached the Deputy Commissioner's Office after passing through the main streets of the city. They submitted a memorandum to the Government through the office of the Deputy Commissioner and dispersed.

Memorandum

In the memorandum, they said that over 95 per cent of workers in India were in the unorganised sector. This included 75 per cent of those in agriculture. They did not have job security. There was no law to regulate their working conditions or guarantee benefits. Important bills to ensure minimum wages and regulate work conditions were still pending in Parliament and State Assemblies. Many Government departments employed workers on contract, but did not pay them minimum wages.

The Government should not only enact a law to regulate this, but also implement it effectively. Unorganised workers should get provident fund, pension and other benefits, the memorandum said.

Most of the workers in the unorganised sector had not got ration cards. The rules governing the distribution of such cards were unscientific and had kept out the needy from the ambit of Public Distribution System. This should be changed. All workers in this sector should get BPL (Below Poverty Line) cards, it said.

Members of the Communist Party of India (CPI), unorganised workers' union, All India Trade Union Congress, Students Federation of India, women's federation of India and other organisations participated.

Among those present were CPI secretary Baburao Honna, building construction workers' union leader Sangashetty Patil and unorganised workers' service centre head Jagannath Maharaj.

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