On the International Women’s Day, coinciding with the Iconic week of Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav, two key constituents of the Ministry of Labour and Employment Labour EPFO and ESIC along with DGMS ran a series of women-friendly measures including steps to process all claims of women, and a first of its kind “Women’s Empowerment Desks” to cater to women stakeholders for one-stop service delivery.

A function was jointly organized by EPFO, ESIC & DGMS on the theme “value and empower the women workforce” yesterday here , attended by Shri Bhupendra Yadav, Minister for Labour & Employment, Shri Rameswar Teli, Minister of State for Labour & Employment, Shri Sunil Barthwal, Secretary, Ministry of Labour & Employment, Smt. Neelam Shami Rao, Central Provident Fund Commissioner, Shri M.S Bhatia, DG ESIC and others.

Speaking at the occasion Shri Bhupendra Yadav lauded the unique initiatives taken by EPFO and ESIC two of the key constituents of Labour Ministry who are citizen-centric faces of the Government. He said, “While EPFO symbolizes Trust, ESIC compliments through Services”. Elaborating further he appreciated the unique services planned to celebrate women’s day namely clearing of all women claims in EPFO and ESIC. He added that the Government of India is committed to not only ensuring equality at the workplace and not only to choose a work but also the freedom to choose the right work, and equal freedom to secure health. Sunil Bharthwal Labour Secretary in his address said that the larger goal of the Government is to ensure that Women’s Participation in the workplace is in proportion to their population.

As a part of Azadi ka Amrit Utsav, EPFO has been targeting 75 lakh e-nominations and especially for women’s day, it has run a campaign to get the women workforce to file their e nominations. EPFO crossed its target by reaching a figure of 92 lakhs. Of these 70 lakhs chose women as their nominees thus empowering spouses, daughters, mothers.

The special week-long drive was also attempted to accelerate the e-nominations of women members joining hands with the establishments and proactively reaching out to them through special camps by the field offices of EPFO. Responding to the call 10415 establishments reported 100% e-nominations of their female workforce. In total 7 lakh e-nominations were filed by women members, from just the top 100 establishments in the country.

Chennai Zone received and processed a maximum number of claims and EPFO RO Coimbatore processed the maximum such claims. Of 7 lakh such e-nominations, Telangana Zone accounted for 44%. EPFO Nizamabad, a constituent office of Telangana Zone and primarily serving Beedi establishments accounted for 39% of all such e-nominations filed. These offices received a special recognition award.

In yet another campaign, it targeted the processing of all women claims as of 5^th March 2022. This initiative ending March settled 144069 women claims for a total amount of about Rs 638 crores in a week-long exercise. Last year in 2021, EPFO had conducted a pilot of settling all claims of its female subscribers in one of its Delhi offices. This now has been replicated across all offices in India by EPFO to symbolically celebrate Women’s Day 2022 as an empowerment display of priority services.

EPFO Noida bagged the award of being instrumental in toping total e nominations filed in all the three categories of small, medium and large establishments separately. The small category defined establishment subscriber’s strength between 100-200, a medium between 201-200 the large ones as 500 or more subscribers. Two establishments namely Manpower Group Services Pvt of Delhi Ltd and M/s Uflex Pvt. Ltd of Noida being amongst the top 75 establishments in the country to file maximum number of e-nominations received awards on behalf of all 75 establishments. All 75 such leading establishments get a special citation.

The Minister virtually launched a “Women’s Empowerment Desks” in Chennai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Delhi and Mumbai as the first Women Empowerment Desk to cater to all women stakeholder interactions with EPFO today. 

The Minister also distributed recognition awards to 03 Women Corona Warriors from ESIC namely Dr. Jayashree Shiv Kumar Bhale, Andhra Pradesh, Mrs. Uma Gopinath, Medical Officer KK Nagar Mrs Meenakshi Paramedical Staff all of ESIC hospitals. He also felicitated 04 first time employed women mine-workers in India namely Aruna Narayan Sankatala and Bipasha Biswas of Opencast mines and Sandhya Rasakatla along with Yogeshwari Rane from underground mines.

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RKJ/IG