The Union Cabinet has approved Rs 22,810 crore towards the Atmanirbhar Bharat Rojgar Yojana (ABRY) to boost employment and incentivize employment creation in India’s formal job sector. This comes amid the COVID-19 pandemic as is a part of the Centre’s Atmanirbhar Bharat 3.0 economic package.The Cabinet, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has sanctioned expenditure of Rs 1,584 crore for the current financial year (FY20-21), and Rs 22,810 crore for the entire scheme duration of 2020-2023.
Here are the salient features of ABRY: Government of India will provide subsidy for two years in respect of new employees engaged on or after October 01, 2020, and up to June 30, 2021 Government will pay full 24 percent contribution of wages towards the Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) for two years — comprising the employees’ 12 percent contribution and employers’ 12 percent contribution, for new employees in establishments that have up to 1,000 employees. Government will pay only employees’ share of EPF contribution (12 percent of wages) for two years for new employees in establishments that have more than 1,000 employees. Eligibility of the scheme extends to employees drawing monthly wage of less than Rs 15,000: – even if they were not working in an establishment registered with the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) before October 1, 2020, or did not have a Universal Account Number (UAN) or EPF Member account number prior to October 1, 2020. Mean-while, India has recorded 31,522 fresh Covid-19 cases taking the country’s total number of cases to 97,67,372. India has also recorded 412 deaths due to coronavirus in the past 24 hours, taking the death toll to 1,41,772. Among the 97 lakh coronavirus cases, India’s total number of active Covid-19 cases now stands at 3,72,293. The total number of discharged cases is now at 92,53,306 with 37,725 new discharges in the last 24 hours. Meanwhile, Maharashtra’s Covid-19 tally on Wednesday rose to 18,64,348 as it recorded 4,981 new cases. With 75 new fatalities, the death toll reached 47,902 in Maharashtra. A total of 5,111 patients were discharged from hospitals after treatment, taking the tally of recovered cases in the state to 17,42,191. There are 73,166 active patients in Maharashtra now. Delhi recorded 2,463 fresh coronavirus cases on Wednesday with over 72,000 tests being conducted, even as the positivity rate dropped to 3.42%. Delhi saw 50 coronavirus deaths on Wednesday, the lowest since November 1, said the government.
