Dear Harsh
in addition to my above post, i would like to add that so far as ESI is concerned, it s now immaterail whether it is a factory or establsihment in so far as coverage is concerned, since the threshold limit for coverage has been brought down from 20 employees to 10 in all most all states even for establsihments other than factories as consequence of which both factories and other establishments employing ten or more persons are covered under ESI.
In so far as P.F Act is concerned, I would like to refer to caluse (a) of Sub-sec.(3) of Sec.(1) of the P.F.Act 1952 which deals with the application of the Act to factories. it states that the P.F act applies to every establsishment which is a factory specified under Schedule (1) appended to the Act in which twenty or more persons are employed.
Clause(b) of Sub.sec.(1)of sec.(1) deals with application of P.F Act to establsihmenst other than factories and states that P.F Act is applicable to establsihments employing twenty or more persons.
Besides, the Government of India in it's notification dated 27th July 2006 extended the application of P.F Act to establishments which are software comapnies provided they employ 20 or more persons.
Thus position that emerges out of the above discussion is asunder :
1)So far as coverage of ESI is concerned, whether a unit is a factory or establsihment (other than factory) it shall employe 10 or more persons.
2) so fra as coverage of P.f is concerned, a unit whether it is a factory or establsihment it shall emply 20 or more persons to be covered under P.F Act.
B.Saikumar
HR & Labour Law advisor
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