Keeping the pot boiling on the question of reserving jobs for socially underprivileged in the private sector, Sunil Mittal, promoter of India's largest private telecom company Bharti, on Thursday said any law to impose quotas would only encourage contract labour.
"The organised sector has employed 8.1 million people...the capacity to absorb more is less. Something needs to be done collectively but any legislation would not be desirable as this would force the corporates to opt for contract labour," Mittal said.
Mittal, who is also the vice-president of CII, maintained that providing job quotas for the socially underprivileged in private sector should be voluntary and the industry should not be forced to implement reservation.
"Industry needs to do something about it (uplift of underprivileged) but at the same time there should not be any legislation in this regard," he said while announcing a new initiative by his group to set up primary schools across rural India.
Asked whether setting up of schools was in response to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's call to corporates to fulfil their social obligation, Mittal said, "It was just a step in the direction and I hope that other corporates would also join in."
Earlier, he had said that the industry and government need to come together to adopt some middle path to solve this issue.
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