Pregnant Teacher Pressured to Resign: How Can Schools Ignore Maternity Leave Laws?

Pregnant teacher refused leave, pressured to resign - Pune Mirror

Lokseva school employee asked to take three months' unpaid leave instead of government regulation of six

It has almost been a year since the central government passed the amendment in the Maternity Benefit Bill, making it mandatory for employers to grant maternity leave of six months to all female employees. However, the benefits of the bill, it seems, are yet to reach the beneficiaries. This is the state of the education sector, where people are learned, yet some establishments still want to avoid following rules.

The employee needs to take up the matter in writing to the Labour Commissioner and the District Education Officer about the blatant violation of maternity laws. Being silent or backing down at this stage will encourage further violations of the law by the school management.

The strength to bypass the law

Thank you for sharing the news item. It has been a year since the new Maternity Benefits Act was passed. However, where do employers find the strength to bypass the law? They derive their strength from two factors. One is the lack of deterrence for transgressing the law. There is no deterrence because our governments, whether at the union level or in the states, simply pass laws without bothering to create additional mechanisms for their implementation.

The timidity of employees

The second factor is the timidity of the employees. They often refuse to stand up for their rights. In this forum, there was a query from a person in Mumbai whose wife's employer refused to grant maternity leave. She was pressured to resign from her job so that the employer could avoid paying her maternity benefits. I did my best to encourage her to file a complaint with the labor office. However, the timid lady refused to stand up for her rights. When her husband told me this out of sheer frustration, I asked why today's women keep their self-esteem out of their feminist movement.

Nevertheless, as long as women continue to be cowed down, more news like this will be published. Such incidents have been reported before and will likely continue in the future.

Thank you,
Dinesh Divekar

Increasing Awareness of Legal Rights

The idea of putting up this post was to increase awareness. Employers will try to cut their expenses. Laws are meant to be bypassed as far as possible (totally wrong attitude). The school in question is said to be run by a politically involved person, as per the article, and may have no fear that the law will act against them properly. Unless one is conscious of their rights and develops the willingness to stand up for legal rights enforcement, the laws will remain on paper. Of course, it also goes without saying that emphasis on rights and duties are natural corollaries of each other.