Par panel for raising limit to 300 workers for lay-offs without govt nod

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Labour has supported the idea of allowing companies having less than 300 workers to go for retrenchment or closure without government permission.

This proposal has been the bone of contention at tripartite discussions on the Industrial Relation Code and attracted criticism especially from trade unions.

The committee in its report on the proposed Industrial Relation Code 2019 submitted to the Lok Sabha Speaker earlier this week stated, "Threshold be increased accordingly in the Code itself and the words ''as may be notified by the Appropriate Government'' be removed because reform of labour laws through the executive route is undesirable."
The committee stated in its report that it finds no plausible reason for expanding the ambit of this provision indiscriminately to all the industrial establishments as