New Delhi, February 24
Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee said today that his government would restructure many public sector undertakings (PSUs)as part of its disinvestment programme, but assured protection of workers’ interest in the face of liberalisation and economic reforms.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee hands a Shram Award to Padmashree SK (R) , while Union Labour Minister Satyanarayan Jatiya (C) looks on during a ceremony in New Delhi on Saturday. The awards are given to workers in the public sector in recognition for their distinguished performances and outstanding contributions. — Reuters photo

Emphasising that the economic reforms programme is meant to help all sections of workers, especially those in the unorganised sector, the Prime Minister said, “We have begun to reform the economic progress to create more employment opportunities.” Asserting that protection and promotion of workers’ interests were an “integral part of our reform strategy,” Mr Vajpayee, while presenting the Shram Awards for 1999, said, “As part of our disinvestment programme, we will restructure many of our public sector undertakings. Some perennially loss-making units may even have to be shut down.” Stating that his government believed that workers’

welfare went beyond the implementation of legal rights, he said, “We are taking effective steps to extend the reach of social security through innovative schemes like Janashree Beema Yojana.”

He said India could benefit from dramatic changes in technology to compete successfully in the global market, and added that we must gear up to meet the international competition in our own domestic market.

Describing labour as the most important pillar of economic activity, Mr Vajpayee said, “He had no doubt that a revitalised and re-energised working class can become the engine of faster growth to build a strong and prosperous India.”

Listing some of the achievements of the decade-old economic reforms, the Prime Minister said the economy needs to grow at 9 per cent a year in the next decade so that poverty could be further reduced by half.

“This calls for an urgent change in the mindset of Indian entrepreneurs and workers,” he said.

Mr Vajpayee suggested that agriculture, industry and services sectors must begin to benchmark themselves against world standards, improve efficiency and increase the quality of every product and adopt better technologies and work practices.

Praising the innovative capabilities of the winners of the prestigious Shram Awards, the Prime Minister said such recognition of the role of labour was necessary in the context of economic reforms.

He said the government would quicky implement all accepted recommendations of the second National Commission on Labour, which was expected to submit its report by October.

Stating that agricultural labourers today received neither much legal protection nor any social security, he said the Labour Ministry was working on a comprehensive social-security scheme for this sector.

Seventeen awards were given to the workers of central and state governments in recognition of their distinguished performance, innovative abilities and outstanding contribution to productivity and exceptional courage and presence of mind.

The second highest honour, Shram Bhushan (two in number), was conferred on five workers. One of the two Shram Bhushan Awards was jointly shared by a team comprising R. Venkata Subbaiah, K. Pardha Saradhi Rao and G. Dayanand Swamy of the Deference Research and Development Laboratory, Hyderabad.

The other Shram Bhushan award was jointly shared by Ramachandran Asokan and M. S. Joseph of the naval dockyard, Visakhapatnam.

Each award carries Rs 1 lakh and a “sanad” (citation).

Six Shram Vir Awards, carrying Rs 60,000 and a “sanad”, were shared by 12 workers. Four of these were conferred individually, while one has been shared by six workers and the other by two workers.