There are two categories exempted and excluded. Under the exempted categories, the EPFO has the power to exempt large organisation from depositing EPF with the body. The EPF can be maintained by a trust created by the organisation for the purpose.
Under the excluded category, a particular industry’s PF has been excluded from the purview of the EPFO under various Acts. These provident funds regulated by different ministries like shipping, coal, railways, banking, government PF and other PFs.
The panel observed that there is no formal regulating system for an organisation on matters of PF under the PF Act 1925 and the excluded category of PF is not regulated either by their respective ministry or the EPFO.
It was of the view that various organisations or establishments which fall under excluded category have themselves developed their own rules, which, many times, are not in the interest of the employees, workers or labourers and lead to no discipline on the type of investments made from the PF corpus.
The committee said, “It has been noticed that various banks managing their own PF, sometimes attach the PF credit/contributions in the name of disciplinary action, which is arbitrary and illegal. Therefore, there is a need to establish norm by Labour Ministry to act as guidelines to these organisations for formulating their rules for the sake of uniformity as well as for the welfare of their employees.
Source: First Post