Trade unions on Tuesday disrupted a meeting of EPFO trustees protesting against the Government’s decision to appropriate unclaimed PF money for funding senior citizens’ welfare schemes.
labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, who was chairing the meeting of the Central Board of Trustees (CBT) sought to calm down the tempers by assuring them that he would take up the matter with concerned ministers and even Prime Minister Narendra Modi. CBT is the apex decision making body of EPFO.
Soon after the supplementary agenda item on notification regarding Senior Citizen Welfare Fund was circulated for information of trustees, the trade union members walked out of the meeting in protest against the Government’s decision. As per the notification, “any credit balance in any of the account under the following scheme (including EPF scheme) remaining unclaimed for a period of seven years from date of its declaration as an inoperative account shall be transferred by the respective institutions (including EPFO) holding them to the Fund (Senior Citizen Welfare Fund).”
Dattatreya too left the meeting midway and approached the trade union representatives to pacify them and requested them to join again. The agitated trade union representatives told the minister that the notification of the government is not legally tenable and would not stand for long in the Supreme Court.