ISF approached the Ministry of Labour and Employment and the Ministry of Finance seeking immediate protection of livelihood for temporary workers in the country.

To incentivise firms to keep these staffs on the payroll, ISF suggested to the ministry to reduce social contributions for both the employer and employee by half to 6%, not to raise minimum wages for next 12 months and change the Goods and Service Tax for employment services industry from 18% to 5%.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has put our country in a lockdown and several industries who are principal employers are unable to put these employees to productive work”, said Lohit Bhatia, president at Indian Staffing Federation. “The implications are hitting severely as livelihoods are unsustainable any further as employment are lost by thousands”, he continued.