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Hero Kumar (Engineer)     25 October 2013

Indian law similar to out of hours working banned by german

Hi All,

I am having a query regarding the Employment laws in india.

I am working in an IT industry where we need to work for 10 hours in office and after that we have to support on-call for the rest of the day.

We will be forced to respond to calls and work from home even in our personal time and sleeping time.

Today german ministry has banned managers from calling or emailing staff out of hours except in emergencies

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10276815/Out-of-hours-working-banned-by-German-labour-ministry.html

Can any body tell me is there any similar law in india?

if no, is there a way to request the indian labour ministry to introduce a similar law?

Thanks&Regards,

Hero Kumar

 



Learning

 5 Replies

Jairaj (Partner)     25 October 2013

by definition of the terms "workman" and "employee" and "establishment"and  "employer" one needs to ascertain if labour laws such as minimum wages act,  shops and commercial establishments act etc apply to your case. the labour laws in india do stipulate minimum work hours, minimum wages, conduct and welfare of employees but are establishment or work specific. as far as getting new legislation introduced is concerned, optimism is always appreciable but not always practical.

Kumar Doab (FIN)     25 October 2013

You and redg. office/HO of the company are in which state?

IT companies are covered by Shops and Commercial Establishments Act.

Your state might have not granted any exemption to the IT industry from the provisions of Industrial Employment Standing Orders Act…………………………………

Daily work hours are 8 and above that OT is applicable.

IT/ITeS/BPO/KPO employees had formed employee’s unions/groups/forums and have done a good job too.

 

 

hero king (Engineer)     25 October 2013

Thanks Kumar Doab

I am working in chennai and my company's head office is in mumbai.

i am able to  understand that "Daily work hours are 8 and above that OT is applicable"

So whom should i contact if i am asked to work for 10 hours and more?

Also is there any provision in the indian law that prevent managers from calling employees after the working hours or questioning the employees for not attending the calls out of office hours?

 

 

 

 

Kumar Doab (FIN)     26 October 2013

You may go thru:

>> Tamilnadu Shops and Commercial Establishments Act which should be available at the website of Dept. of Labor Tamilnadu or you can download from internet or buy from market.

Section: 2.Definitions: 3,4,8,

11(Periods of work” means the time during which a person employed is at the disposal of the employer), 12(III),18,19

And Section 4:1(a),13,

And section

14: Daily and weekly hours of work.--  (1) sub-jet to  the provisions of this Act, no person employed in any establishment shall be required or allowed to  work for more than eight hour in any day and forty-eight hours in any week:

                    Provided that any such person may be allowed to  work in such establishment for any period  in excess of the limit fixed under this sub-section subject to payment of overtime wages, if the period of work, including overtime work, does not exceed ten hours in any day and in the aggregate fifty-four hours in any week.

{{ This means that (when this clause is read alone or with clause13) that beyond the scheduled duty hours/work hours employee shall not be allowed to remain in office. If at all has to be in office it has to be with prior permission of responsible official of the company.

This was seen in some cases when employees lodged complaint with Inspector under this Act and Labor Inspector the Managers issued a circular that no one is allowed to remain in office beyond duty hour’s until or unless permitted by BM in writing and security staff was asked to obtain and record the permission of manager.

Therefore the attendance record, time in/ time out, time in official email etc may suffice as time spent on work. }}

 

And section

15,16,25,26,27,28,

31: Wages for overtime work,

32,43

The claim for OT should be lodged in reasonable time.

Ideally company and its officials should send official communication to employees to work time.

To avoid and circumvent the payment the officials resort to tactics and avoid sending such communications and if employee claim then it is usually replied that employee was spending tie on his own or employee did not finish the usual and routine work etc………….

However the employee should download record even if by email, phone, and record calls during which employee was asked, coerced to work for OT.

>> You may also refer to provisions in (Name of State) National Festival and holidays Act:

In Tamilnadu this enactment may be enacted as:

The Tamil Nadu Industrial Establishments (National and Festival Holidays) Act, 1958

Act 33 of 1958

2(e) (i): Shops and Commercial Establishments are covered (Read it with Sec 2 (6) of Tamilnadu Shops and Commercial Establishments Act)

You may also refer to the list of holidays provided by your company and declared by Tamilnadu state for Shops and Commercial Establishments.

After the close/opening or duty hours no official of the company has any business to call or approach employee. There is no requirement to enact law for it. If you are entertaining official business after work hours it is your sweet will.

Duty hours or period of work hours is the time during which employee is at the disposal of employer (as cited above also).

The ILO guidelines are to reduce the work hours from 48 to 40 hours/week.

>>  The designation alone does not decide employee is a workman as in ID Act or employee as in Shops and Commercial Establishments Act.

The work hours are also stated in Standing orders (certified/Model) applicable to the establishment framed under THE INDUSTRIAL EMPLOYMENT (STANDING ORDERS) ACT, 1946.

The term Industry does not mean factory alone.

The Standing Order Act is applicable to all establishments to which the Payment of Wages Act, 1936 applies…………………. Section 2 (e) THE INDUSTRIAL EMPLOYMENT (STANDING ORDERS) ACT, 1946.

The state of Karnataka had granted 2 year exemption to the IT and it 5 times, since 1999 and the exemption lasted 12 years.

The IT/ITeS employees association/groups had been protesting and finally the state of Karnataka ended this exemption and all companies were advised to submit draft standing orders by Dec12 for certification by Mar13.

The state of Karnataka had granted 2 year exemption to the IT and it 5 times, since 1999 and the exemption lasted 12 years.

The IT/ITeS employees association/groups had been protesting and finally the state of Karnataka ended this exemption and all companies were advised to submit draft standing orders by Dec12 for certification by Mar13.

 

You may go thru following threads

https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/experts/Certified-standing-order-notice-period-and-applicability-427416.asp

https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/experts/Standing-orders-426366.asp#.Umt_MHCAqWM

and

Model Standing Orders:

4.             Publication of working time: The periods and hours of work for all classes of workers in each  shift shall be exhibited in English………………………

5.             Publication of holidays and pay-days

8.             Attendance and late coming

9.             Leave

17.          Liability of 17[employer

 

If you and other employees have decided to lodge claim for OT it may be submitted and let company reply whatever it want to.

It is known to one and all that the employees are coerced, forced, pressurized. It is believed that phone calls are not a record.

However if you are using Smartphone which are available for say Rs.5000/ and using software like ‘Trucaller’ which is free, every call gets recorded without any beep sound.

The calls recording cam be saved. The memory card can be saved. The minutes of discussion can be submitted same day or the following day even if by email covering the time of call task given and task completed.

The employees should unite and form forums/IC/associations/unions etc and affiliate with trade unions or join trade unions directly.

Such matters are best resolved when employees re united.

IT employees had formed unions in AP, Karnataka, West Bengal and major trade unions are willing to embrace IT employees.

We have heard that recently the employees in private life insurance companies united in Kerala, Tamilnadu and company were forced to reinstate all terminated employees.

Had these employees approached court of law they would have remained dumped in courts for many years.

IT employees Unions:

https://www.itpfindia.org/ http://www.itecentre.co.in/ 

Contact Us

Please contact us on mail id : 

contact@itecentre.co.in. ph : 9620907912

Please Join ITEC group for discussion among IT-BPO employees.

To join the group, please send a blank mail to itec_bangalore-subscribe@yahoogroups.com 

https://ithiworld.wikispaces.com/News+Update 

ITHI, a forum of women employees in IT and ITeS

IT/BPO Voice of India | Facebook

CBPOP (the present UNIDOC) 

 

 

www.unitespro.org https://www.wbitsa.org/

 

 

 

 

The trade Unions are willing to embrace the employees in your sector and can guide from their rich experience. You should access their websites and speak to them too.

 

 

 

 

All India United Trade Union Centre (INTUC)

 

 

Centre for  Indian Trade Union (C I T U )

 

 

National Centre for Labour(NCL)

Bharatiya  Mazdoor  Sangha (BMS)

 

 

It shall be appropriate to show all of your docs including job advertisement, job application, interview call letter, selection letter, offer letter, appointment letter, standing orders,…………………………………etc and record to a competent and experienced labor consultant/service lawyer and proceed under expert advice.

 

The lawyer that has seen all of your docs can advise you the best.

 

 

 

 

  


Attached File : 353928979 the tamil nadu shops ant establishment act %26 rules.doc, 353928979 model%20standing%20orders.doc downloaded: 153 times

Sudhir Kumar, Advocate (Advocate)     27 October 2013

well elaborated by Mr Kumar Doab

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