Are Daily Wage Workers Entitled to a Weekly Day Off After 3 Years? Seeking Legal Guidance

We have been employing workers on a daily wage basis continuously for more than 3 years but have not been providing a weekly day off. However, we pay double overtime if they are asked to come in for work, and we also pay for public holidays. Should workers who work for 6 days be entitled to a weekly day off?

Entitlement to Weekly Day Off

Is the rule of 240 days in a year applicable to them to become permanent employees? If so, to which act should I refer? Is there any notification regarding such applicability?

Rule of 240 Days for Permanent Employment

Regards

Wage Calculation and Weekly Off

If you are calculating wages based on 26 days per month, there is no need for a weekly off because the calculation is based on 26 days and is compensated accordingly.

Criteria for Permanent Employment

240 days are not the criteria for becoming permanent (subject to the job not being a core activity or of a perennial nature).

Hope this information helps you.

Thank you for your reply. In our company, union members are stressing since they have been working for more than 2 years regularly. They say they are deemed permanent and hence should get paid a weekly off like permanent staff.

If the contract workers have been working for more than 2 years and are still working, does it mean that the work is of a perennial nature, right? Then why don't you engage permanent workmen there?

Thank you for your reply. Being regular with us, we are providing them with PF, ESIC, Annual Leave up to 20 days, and Gratuity. Besides these benefits as per government rules, what else can we offer them? What are the rights of permanent workers? Can we not pay the daily wages (maintaining the minimum wage act with every update) to these workers regularly (until their tenure)?

How Does a Daily Wage Worker Become Permanent?

How do permanent workers differ from daily wage workers?

Kindly advise us.

Thank you,

Regards,
RN Kumar

Continuous Employment and Legal Obligations

With reference to your query, if an employee has worked more than 240 days in an establishment or 180 days in a mine (under cost), including absences for temporary disablement due to an accident, maternity leave for a female employee up to 90 days, strike and lockout that were not illegal on the part of the employee, and excluding weekly offs and holidays in a calendar year, it falls under the realm of continuous employment as per Sections 79 and 80 of the Factories Act - 1948, as well as Section 25 (b) of the ID Act - 1947 Rules. This provision ensures the continuity for an employee towards permanent status.

According to the aforementioned provision, we can engage labor on a daily wage basis for work that is of a casual, intermittent, or perennial nature.

The statutory obligations are also fulfilled by the employer even when engaging on a daily basis. We will also provide coverage under the PF, ESI, and Gratuity Acts for such employees.

Regards,
V R RAO PULIPAKA

Thank you for your prompt reply. It is understood that our current practices are correct, and we can proceed with paying the permanent workers on a daily wage basis while ensuring compliance with PF/ESIC/PT/Gratuity/Bonus/Annual leave entitlements as well as providing for yearly 10 holidays.

Thanks once again.

Regards,
RNKUMAR

- Do you have any permanent workers, and are you treating them differently from these daily-waged workers? If there is a difference, then obviously daily-waged workers will long for and ask for those benefits enjoyed by permanent workers. According to the details provided by you, you cannot have two different categories of workers.

However, daily-waged workers can become permanent workers. This means that permanent workers can be paid wages on a per-day basis.

Contract work pe kaam karte hue 2 saal ka contract hai. Hafte mein ek din ki chhuti milti hai aur daily wage ke hisab se hamein sirf 26 din ka vetan milta hai. Kya hamein weekly off ka vetan nahi mil sakta?