Labour Laws vis-à-vis Labour Codes

 

Part – 4

New Labour Codes on hold:

The implementation of four labour codes, due on April 1, has been put off by the Centre. A senior labour ministry official mentioned that the delay in implementation occurred since some of the state governments were yet to finalize the rules. Labour is a concurrent subject under the Constitution. Therefore, both the Centre and the states required to notify rules under the codes to enforce the law in their respective states.

 The Union labour ministry had earlier said, “Implementation of the central laws will not be contingent on states making their rules. We would like to have some major states ready at least.” Some of the BJP-ruled states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and Uttarakhand have only circulated the draft rules for two codes. Karnataka has circulated draft rules for one code. So far, Jammu and Kashmir is the only state that has finalized its rules. The Union labour ministry has also finalized the rules under the four codes. S Unnikrishnan, chairman of CII National Committee on Industrial Relations, said, although the labour codes would have provided enough flexibility to employers and significantly improved the ‘ease of doing business’; companies never wanted to rush into implementation of the codes.

 According to the government sources, there is no clarity, as yet, on the timeline when the codes may now be implemented. Some industry experts told the media that elections in a few states had delayed the entire process while the resurgence of Covid cases in many states had also diluted the focus to some extent. The news published in the Bloomberg Quint on March 16, 2021 informed that the new labour codes would “definitely” not be implemented from April 1. The news further indicated that the government would target implementing the new labour laws from May. Perhaps, we shall have to wait till the state assembly poll results are declared. Because, Modi-government has “deferred” the implementation of the four labour codes but not withdrawn. Therefore, we should continue to deliberate upon the subject.

 A delay in framing of rules by states under the labour codes has been cited as a key reason for the delayed implementation. However, the opposition by the trade unions can never be simply ignored. After making the draft labour rules public in October-November 2020, the central government started series of consultations with industry and trade union representatives. On February 3, 2021 the Union labour ministry called a tripartite meeting to discuss draft labour rules on OSH code. All central trade unions except Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh (an RSS affiliate) and independent national federations boycotted the meeting and demanded of putting all four labour codes on hold to discuss afresh on each of them. The news was hardly covered by the mainstream media.

 Labour Laws vis-à-vis Labour Codes:

In some statutes we find “Act” been written in the last. For example, Industrial Disputes Act, 1947; The Sales Promotion Employees (Conditions of Service) Act, 1976 etc. On the other hand, we find “Code” been written. For example, The Industrial Relations Code, 2020; The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 (OSH Code) etc. It is important to know the difference between the two.

 Generally speaking, an Act is a Bill which has passed through the various legislative steps required for it and which has become law. For enactment of an Act, a draft is formulated which is then to be passed by the Parliament. And once passed, it gets assent from the President and, thereafter, it becomes an Act. 

 A Code, on the other hand, is a collection of already existing laws, rules and regulations. However, Code is not only a compilation of already existing statutes, but also of the unwritten law on any subject composed of materials available from all sources. Often, in making a code, new laws will be included and existing old laws may be repealed to constitute a complete system. Therefore, the implementation of the four new labour codes, replacing 29 Central labour laws, needs to be read with caution since the protective old laws will be subsumed and, finally, be repealed.

 The next article will elaborate the exceedingly harmful features of the Industrial Relations Code.

@pradipsinterpretations