"Around 15 per cent of workers employed in factories and industries are still working under 'hazardous conditions'. Unless special care is taken of such industries, they may cause substantial damage not only to our workers but also to the environment," S B Mathur, Director General of Directorate General Factories Advice Service and Labour Institutes (DGFASLI) said here.
Mathur was speaking as the chief guest at the two-day international conference on safety, which began at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Gandhinagar today.
He said that India still suffers from the stigma of a country, where the worst chemical disaster took place despite having progressed in almost all the fields.
"It is time for India to demonstrate to the world that the country is now capable of handling any technology of highest safety standards of international level," he said.
In his keynote address, Sam Mannan, Regents Director, Department of Chemical Engineering, Texas A&M University, said that instead of giving appraisals for abiding safety measures, workers should rather be strictly punished for not following safety norms.
Mannan said that there have been instances, where workers try to suppress information about accidents so that they do not miss on their appraisals. "If you fire a worker for not maintaining safety rules, the worker might lose his job, but you will be saving his life," said Mannan.
Around 400 participants from countries including Kuwait, China, USA, Israel and Netherlands, professionals from industries and various IITs attended the conference.
Headquartered in Mumbai, the DGFASLI is an attached body under the Union Ministry of Labour and Employment, which helps the Ministry to formulate policies on occupational safety and health in factories and docks.