EPFO Updates: The Central Board of Trustees of the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation is set to consider a report to include more workers. The review is to be made at an upcoming meeting of the CBT, the apex decision-making body of the organisation.
According to insiders, the report contains two main proposals: lowering the threshold for the number of workers employed by a firm to be eligible for coverage and increasing the cap on the salary.
As of right now, a firm with 20 or more workers is mandated to register under the EPFO. The report is understood to have suggested halving this to include firms with 10 workers or more.
In a similar fashion, the report also proposed to raise the current monthly wage ceiling of ₹15,000 to ₹21,000 in order to bring in more workers under the coverage of the scheme. This would also sync the wage ceiling with that of the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation.
“These are some of the key proposals of the ad hoc committee on coverage that was set up. It is likely to be taken up for discussion in the upcoming meeting of the CBT,” said a source.
The CBT is scheduled to meet on July 29 and 30. The last such revision in the wage ceiling for the EPF scheme was done in 2014.
“At present, there are over 5 crore active members of the EPF scheme. The objective is to expand the coverage of the scheme to bring in more workers and provide them with social security,” said the source.
Since the Labour codes are expected to go public soon, it is yet to be seen how and when the proposal may be implemented.
“While the Labour Codes are not in the jurisdiction of the CBT, the discussions will have to be on how to expand the coverage of the EPF in the backdrop of these Codes,” said the source. Several trade unions have also been pursuing an increase in the wage ceiling to grow the umbrella of coverage of the scheme.
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