Can Casual Laborers Demand Permanent Employment After 240 Days? Seeking Advice

Dear Friends,

We have deployed 40-50 laborers on a casual basis, and we are paying their wages into our account. We are also complying with PF & ESIC under our company registration code and maintaining all applicable records as per the law. In this practice, can any worker claim permanent employment or on-roll employment?

Please, we need your guidance and suggestions.

Thanks,
Parag

Dear Parag,

Understanding Casual Employment

One of the meanings of the term "CASUAL" is occasional or irregular. When it is associated with the terms "work" and "worker" as an adjective, it denotes that the work is basically "on and off" or intermittent and thus not regular in nature. This also has a specific connotation for the person engaged in such work as a purely temporary hand whose services are co-terminous with the occasional work. At times, a worker can be engaged in regular or permanent work or perennial work for a shorter duration, and there also he is called a temporary worker. Therefore, the casualness of such employment is determined by both the nature of the work and the duration of the employment of the worker in such work. So the mode of payment of wages and the statutory deductions, if any, made thereof cannot alter the basic character of such employment.

Legal Framework in Tamil Nadu

In the State of Tamil Nadu, there is a special enactment called "The Tamil Nadu Industrial Establishments (Conferment of Permanent Status to Workmen) Act, 1981," which mandates that every temporary workman completing 480 days of continuous service in an industrial establishment covered by the Act within a period of 24 calendar months should be made permanent.

Implications of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947

Whether there is such a law in your state or not, I would like to point out further that the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, declares the practice of keeping workmen on a temporary roll for years together to deprive them of the status and privileges of permanent workmen as an unfair labor practice on the part of the employers [item no. 10 - Part I - Schedule V].

Therefore, it is better to make such casual workmen permanent considering the length of their service and the perennial nature of the work in which they are engaged, irrespective of its type being core or incidental.

Agree with Mr. Umakanthan's comments. You cannot call a worker "casual" while engaging him for 240 days or more.

B. Saikumar
HR & Labour Law Advisor
Navi Mumbai

But what if he keeps an employer on a contract basis by outsourcing. Can that contract employee ask for permanent status in the parent organization?

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Outsourcing of certain activities/operations, which are incidental and intermittent, can be done by engaging contract labor. However, the aspects of incidental and intermittent nature of such an outsourced activity/operation should coexist independently of the duration for the purpose of the CLRA Act, 1970. If either aspect is missing, it can lead to the inference that the contract is a sham.

Any contract labor engaged in genuine contract work can never claim permanency based on the passage of time.