COIMBATORE: The Tamil Nadu Engineering College Technical Staff Association, in a recent petition, has urged the Directorate of Technical Education (DOTE) to ensure the inclusion of temporary staff working in government engineering colleges across the state in the Employees' Provident Fund (EPF) scheme.
The association's state president, R Karthikeyan, told TNIE that there are 11 government engineering colleges in the state and around 1,000 temporary staff members are working on consolidated pay as office assistants, technical staff and in other capacities.
He said that their salaries range from Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000 per month, and that, besides, daily-wage workers such as sanitary workers and watchmen are employed in these colleges.
"Even if a private establishment employs more than 20 workers, it is required to register with the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) and enrol its employees as EPF members to ensure they receive provident fund benefits as part of their social security and welfare. However, the heads of government engineering colleges have failed to do so. As a result, several temporary employees who come from economically-weaker sections have been deprived of the benefits of the EPF scheme," he alleged.
He said that in the absence of the scheme, temporary employees lose out on provident fund benefits, including retirement savings and the facility to make partial withdrawals from their EPF accounts to meet emergency financial needs.
He urged the DOTE director to direct the principals of all government engineering colleges to enrol their temporary employees as members of the EPF scheme without delay.
A youth from Coimbatore, who did not wish to be named, said that his father, who died in 2024, had worked for more than 20 years as a temporary employee at the Government College of Technology (GCT), Coimbatore. He said that if the college administration had enrolled his father under the EPF scheme, the family would have received at least Rs 2 lakh in EPF benefits.
He urged the authorities to ensure EPF coverage for all temporary employees working in government engineering colleges, at least now.
Senior officials of the DOTE were not available for comment.