New Labour Codes – Few Burning Issues

It has taken from decades to about a century to attempt to reform plethora of our archaic labour laws, which has lost its relevance in present day industrial and commercial environment. Multiple rigid statutory compliances, regime of licence-raj, inspector-raj, multiple inspections, absence of bargaining agents, rampant industrial disharmony not only made it difficult to do business, it also kept foreign investors distant away from the country. This situation strongly necessitated consolidation and simplification of plethora of labour laws and to provide atmosphere of ease of doing business. The reforms also required to allow the employer to rationalize its operations, flexibility to deploy right-sized and right-skilled workforce and modern machinery. Keeping all this in view and the recommendations of the second National Commission on Labour, over 40 labour laws have been consolidated into four Codes, namely, The Code on Wages, 2019, The Code on Social Security, 2020, The Industrial Relations Code, 2020 and The Occupational Safety, Health and Working...