New Delhi: Labour Ministry has favoured imposing a cess on select items, including diesel and petrol, for funding its old-age pension for workers in the unorganised sector under the Centre's fold, including airports, railways, ports and other segments.

Toeing the lines of Transport Ministry, which succeeded in getting cess imposed on petrol and diesel for its Golden Quadrilateral project, Labour Ministry is hopeful of such a levy to fund the scheme.

"We are planning a cess," Labour Minister Sahib Singh Verma confirmed, but declined to furnish the details.

This comes after the Union Cabinet referred the ambitious 'Unorganised Sector Workers Bill, 2003' to a GOM (Group of Ministers), headed by Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani.

Verma expressed the hope that the Bill would be passed in Parliament this year itself.

Labour Ministry sources said certain item specific cess could address the sector-specific workers in the unorganised sector within the purview of the Centre.

If some cess could be levied on the tickets or boarding pass in trains and flights, then it would be sufficient enough for the scheme in that sector. Similarly, a cess on certain items arriving through ports or a levy in select packaged or branded products, could take care of workers in those segments, they explained.

When cited that of the 37 crore workers, bulk of them were in the states, the sources said states could identify the items for the imposition of cess.

This move comes in the backdrop that the Finance Ministry is understood to have shot down the Labour Ministry's demand for extra-Budgetary support for the scheme.

PTI