Maximum working hours per day as per indian labour law

hi rajkumar,

i too faced a similar kind of problem.

my manger used to harrass me to work for 18 hours a day and on saturdays 24 hours for 1.2 years  giving a job threat and my releiving letter .. i got frustrated and resigned the job , but even in the notice period they used to force me to sit for 18 hours . i just walked out of the company. now for my experience letter they are asking 82 thousand. i come from a middle class family and i will not be able to pay much.

is there any way i can sue the company . if not my releving letter atleast i want to make sure the harrasment on the employees stops and they work for not more than 8 hours day. please guide .

Dear Sir,

I am working in services based industry we work for 5 days a week that is from monday to friday and our working hour is 8:30 am to 6 pm which includes 30 mints break. So i just wanted to know it correct or we should work for 9 hours in which break will be included.

Please let me know.

Regards,

Asmita

@ Asmita,

Learned experts/members have provided valuable advice in this thread. Kindly follow it.

Your service Industry/office where you are located might have been registered under Shops and Commercial Establishments Act (SE Act) of your state. The registration certificate should be displayed near entrance on notice board. The registration certificate would contain name of employer/manager as applicable under the Act along with all other mandatory details. You may go thru the Act.

The latest version of the Act, contact details of the Labor Inspectors/officials in o/o Labor Commissioner e.g. Labor Inspectors, ALC/DLC, Wages Inspector under Payment of Wages Act, Inspector/Chief Inspector under SE Act, Minimum Wages Act, Factory Act and Inspectors, IESO Act/Model Standing Orders……must be available at Dept. of Labor website of your state.

You are spending 9.30 hours in office as per office hours given to you by company out of which you are granted 30 minutes break; hence you are working for 9 hours/day, which is 1 hour more than 8 hours /day.

The employer take advantage of the ill informed employees and claim that employees were spending extra hours in office on their won and company never wrote to employees for doing OT. The claim of OT should be lodged in reasonable time.

Has your company mentioned work hours in your appointment letter, standing orders, displayed in registration certificate, on notice board, by some circular, email etc….

e.g: SE Act Delhi:

8.      EMPLOYMENT OF ADULTS, HOURS OF WORK.

No adult shall be employed or allowed to work about the business of an establishment for more than nine hours on any day or 48 hours in any week and the occupier shall fix the daily periods of work accordingly:

Provided that during any period of stock taking or making of accounts or any other purpose as may be prescribed, any adult employee may be allowed or required to work for more than the hours fixed in this section, but not exceeding 54 hours in any week subject to the conditions that the aggregate hours so worked shall not exceed 150 hours in a year:

Provided further that advance intimation of at least three days in this respect has been given in the prescribed manner to the Chief Inspector and that any person employed on overtime shall be entitled to remuneration for such overtime work at twice the rate of his normal remuneration calculated by the hour.

Explanation.—For the purpose of calculating  the normal hourly wage the day shall be reckoned as consisting of eight hours.

COMMENTS

(a) Mode for calculation of overtime wages……..

………Claim for overtime should be made within reasonable time……….

……….It is, however clarified that the Delhi Shops & Establishments Act, 1954 is not exhaustive on all the rights and obligations of the employers and the employees as such the provisions of Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 being Central Act governs the matters.For instance if an employer who proposes to effect any change prejudicial to the workmen, in respect of any matter specified in the fourth schedule to the Act, should give the workmen concerned twenty one days notice under section 9A of the Industrial Disputes Act…………

10.  INTERVAL FOR REST AND MEALS

11.  SPREAD OVER.

15.  OPENING AND CLOSING HOURS OF SHOPS AND COMMERCIAL

ESTABLISHMENT

16.  CLOSE DAY.

17.  PERIOD OF REST (WEEKLY HOLIDAY)

18.  WAGES FOR THE HOLIDAY.

19.  TIME AND CONDITIONS OF PAYMENT OF WAGES.

20.  DEDUCTIONS WHICH MAY BE MADE FROM WAGES.

21.  CLAIMS RELATING TO WAGES.

33.  RECORDS.

34.  EMPLOYER TO FURNISH LETTERS OF APPOINTMENT TO EMPLOYEES.

(d)  the hours of work.

35.  INSPECTION OF REGISTERS AND CALLING FOR INFORMATION

37.  POWERS AND DUTIES OF INSPECTOR

COMMENTS

(b) Duties of the Inspector:

(c)  that the interval of rest and holidays required to be granted or observed under the Act are granted and observed and that the limits of hours of work and spread-over laid down under the Act are not exceeded;

(g)  that the provisions of the Act relating to the payment of overtime are duly observed;

(i)  that in dispensing with the services of an employee the provision of the Act and Rules have been complied with and no  dues payable under the Act or Rules have been withheld;

40.  PENALTIES.

41.  WILFULLY MAKING FALSE ENTRIES.

43.  DETERMINATION OF EMPLOYER FOR THE PURPOSE OF THIS ACT

tha maximum working hours are 8 hours in betwen 1/2 hr break in general offices,

I am told as per ILO (India is a signatory ) it is 40 hours a week.

eight hours of work for five day a week.

But it is grossly violated because of money power of emp-loyers.

Pl correct if I am wrong.

Thanks

Hello Everyone,

Does our law include work time in office only? I am in IT industry, my boss had given us laptop to work from home. So we are working 9 hrs from office and than from home.

We are often require to travel as well where we are asked to work 24 hrs a day from hotel room and client location.

Please suggest what can be done in such cases.

Thank you

Sir

In this age of constant communication via email and watsapp and similar medium, employees are under great stress. The boss and the clients expect reply and compliance at any odd hours.

My question is would it be legally alright for me to disconnect from the office and coworkers and boss after working hours? Di I have a legal right to disconnect from work after office jours?

Anjum

@ Anjum,

Such matters are best resolved at plateforms of employee's/Trade union levels and even 'Works Committee', 'Greivance Redressal Committee'.

Individually  the Line Managers/Hr/employer may single you out and harass.

Otherwise during work hours employee is at the disposal of employer.

After work hours:NO.

I want some guidance regarding the situation as soon as possible. The scenario is: A female working as an assistant to the employer (Employer is an individual running a business). The role is, attending calls, guiding clients, scheduling appointments etc.  Work hours are- 10AM to 7PM Six Days a week, no specified breaks, I can have my lunch anytime I want (for which I dont need more than 15mins, rest of the time I work) So, my total working hour including breaks are 9. As per the labour law, I have read, 9hours any day or not more than 48hours in any week. Calculating my hours they come up to 54hours in a week (9*6=54) If I am given a 30mins break I would still be working for 8:30 hours on any days and 51hours in a week.  Please correct my knowledge and guide me how can I rectify this with the employer. Appreciate the response, Thank you

Read more at: https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/forum/Clarity-about-working-hours-breaks-weekly-hours-and-ot--152144.aspI want some guidance regarding the situation as soon as possible. The scenario is: A female working as an assistant to the employer (Employer is an individual running a business). The role is, attending calls, guiding clients, scheduling appointments etc.  Work hours are- 10AM to 7PM Six Days a week, no specified breaks, I can have my lunch anytime I want (for which I dont need more than 15mins, rest of the time I work) So, my total working hour including breaks are 9. As per the labour law, I have read, 9hours any day or not more than 48hours in any week. Calculating my hours they come up to 54hours in a week (9*6=54) If I am given a 30mins break I would still be working for 8:30 hours on any days and 51hours in a week.  Please correct my knowledge and guide me how can I rectify this with the employer. Appreciate the response, Thank you

Read more at: https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/forum/Clarity-about-working-hours-breaks-weekly-hours-and-ot--152144.asp

Same query;

https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/forum/details.asp?mod_id=152144&offset=1

https://www.lawyersclubindia.com/forum/details.asp?mod_id=150398&offset=1

Originally posted by : Kapil
	Hi all Any business undertaking which may be manufacturing or trading or Service (like hotels/hospitals) or Retailing (shops) or BPOs for these organizations what is maximum working hours for a day.  If it becomes 24 hours in a day, what action can be taken for that organization as per indian labour law Kindly guide me.

@Kapil,

Please don't mind, as per my observation, your question is quite vague, as your question does not indicate, whether you wanted to know about the working hours of the organizations or of their employees, when you use the term of 24 hours! Neither any organissation takes the work from its employees for 24 hours, not any employee can have the capacity to work for 24 hours out of 24 hours of a day.

Moreover, you have not referred any specific event to indicate, on whose working hours you want to know about.

Although you received plenty of responses on your question, but every response is aimed at only one aspect of working hours for the employee. 

Can you clarify, about what exactly you wanted to know, i.e., about the organisation's or employee's working hours and for waht specific purpose or problem, as a Principal Engineer?

If you discuss some particular problem, you can get some purposeful responses.

Originally posted by : siddhartha
	My organisation is a leading telecom vendor in india, but its a chinese company. Off late the employees are made to work over 60-70 hours per week without any holidays for 20 days at a stretch and no extra compensation.Wat possible actions could be taken against the company and wat is the right way to go about it? please advice.

If you have any recorded proof of 60-70 work hours of a worker, only then you can expect to win a legal battle on working hours. But, side by side, you may be risking termination of your service. on any pretext by the company.

In such undesirable situations, the only wise step is to switch over to some other job, instead putting the service at stake on legal dispute. 

Originally posted by : Shilpa
	hello, I am working as a recruiter in a consultancy which is a sole proprietorship ans ISO 9001:2000 certified and our timings is 9 am to 6 pm, mon to sat with hulf an hour lunch time i.e 54 hours a week and overtime starts at 6:30 pm wherein our boss doesn't pay anything but compensates oue late coming timings.....is it legal or not.....if not what action can be taken??????????

if you have compromised with the informal arrangement by making adjustments of late coming or early going, nothing is illegal. Otherwise, legally speaking, you can also not be allowed to come later than the fixed opening and closing hours.

If restrictions by boss are not put on employees, the employees are also expected to compromise with the working pattern by mutual understanding and trust in any organization.

Legal recourse can only lead to escalation of disputes, costs, and mental depressions, not workable remedies or ease of working conditions.