MODULE 3:

WELFARE, HEALTH
AND SAFETY OF
WORKERS

Presented by
Ms. Nikita begum Talukdar
Assistant Professor-Senior
Scale
 TOPICS

1. The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions

Code, 2020: About, Objectives
2. Definitions: Appropriate govt., Factory, Worker, occupier,
Manufacturing process, hazardous process
3. Chapter 2, 3, 4 of code: Registration, Duties, National/state
Advisory Boards
4. Chapter 5,6, 7 of code: Health, working and welfare
conditions; Working hours, leaves;

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THE OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY,
HEALTH AND WORKING
CONDITIONS CODE, 2020:

ABOUT AND OBJECTIVES

4
 ABOUT OHSC 2020

5
 NEED OF OCCUPATION
SAFETY, HEALTH CODE

• Nobody can forget the night of December 2, 1984. It was the

night when toxic gases from a pesticide company killed more
than 15,000 people in Bhopal.
• Even though there are provisions for companies to report
injuries or deaths, they don’t provide detailed information
about the accidents themselves.
• It’s only in recent years that there has been some progress in
acknowledging and reporting these accidents, but there is still
a long way to go.

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• Between 2017 and 2020, three people died and 11 were injured each day, on
average, due to accidents in India's registered factories, per data from the
Ministry of Labour & Employment's Directorate General Factory Advice Service &
Labour Institutes (DGFASLI),
• As many as 3,331 deaths more than 4,000 injuries in registered factories were
recorded between 2018 and 2020, but only 14 people were imprisoned for
offences under the Factories Act, 1948 during the same period, these data show.
• DGFASLI collects occupational safety and health (OSH) statistics from state chief
inspectors of factories and directors of industrial safety and health.
• These data represent only registered factories, although about 90% of workers in
India are employed in the informal sector.

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 RECENT INDUSTRIAL
ACCIDENTS

• Mundka, Delhi (27 dead, 40 injured)

• Blast in Fire Cracker factory in MP, Harda (11 dead, 149 injured)
2024
• Vizag gas leak, in LG Polymers plant Vishakhapatnam- 2020 (12 died,
100’s injured)

• Thousands of factory workers lose their hands or fingers, every year,

in crush injuries in the auto-sector manufacturing, mainly as a result of

poor safety culture and high productivity pressure. Most of them, working in

smaller factories for large auto brands, get little support from management.
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 ABOUT OHSC 2020

• The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions

Code, 2020 seeks to consolidate and modify the laws
regulating the occupational safety, health and working
conditions.

• It replaces a whole bunch of labour laws (13 labour laws)

most notably, the Factories Act, 1948; the Mines Act, 1952
and the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act,
1970 apart from the following:

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 The Building and Other Construction
The Factories Act, 1948, Workers (Regulation of Employment
and Conditions of Service) Act, 1996.

The Inter-State Migrant

The Cine-Workers and Cinema
Workmen Theatre Workers (Regulation of
Employment) Act, 1981
The Mines Act, 1952,
The Working Journalists and other
REPEALED Newspaper Employees
Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1955;
The Plantations Labour Act, 1951
The Working Journalists (Fixation
The Contract Labour (Regulation of Rates of Wages) Act, 1958;
and Abolition) Act, 1970,
The Motor Transport Workers Act,
The Dock Workers (Safety, Health 1961;
and Welfare) Act, 1986;
The Beedi and Cigar Workers
The Sales Promotion Employees (Conditions of Employment) Act,
10 (Conditions of Service) Act, 1966;
1976;
APPLICABILITY OF
THE CODE 2020
 industry, trade,
business,
manufacturing
or occupation, 10
or more workers
employed

motor transport
newspaper
establishment,
a mine or port Establishment audio-video
or vicinity of (Section 2 (V) production,
port where Code) building and other
dock work construction work
or plantation,
10 workers

Factory
(for ch. 2 only)
ten or more
workers are
employed
 THE CODE APPLIES TO ESTABLISHMENT.
S. 2 (V) OF OSHWC 2020 "ESTABLISHMENT" MEANS—

1. a place where any industry, trade, 4. a mine or port or vicinity of port

business, manufacturing or
where dock work is carried out:
occupation is carried on in which
ten or more workers are Provided that in sub-clauses (i) and (ii),
employed:
the threshold of worker specified therein
2. motor transport undertaking, shall not be applicable in case of such
newspaper establishment, audio-
establishment or class of establishments, in
video production, building and
other construction work or which such hazardous or life
plantation, in which ten or more threatening activity is being carried on,
workers are employed
as may be notified by the Central
3. Factory, for the purpose of Chapter Government:
II (Registration), in which ten or
more workers are employed,
notwithstanding the threshold of
 APPLICABILITY: DOES NOT APPLY TO

• It shall not apply to the offices of the Central Government, offices of the
State Government and any ship of war of any nationality

• Provided that the Code shall apply in case of contract labour

employed through contractor in the offices of the Central
Government or in the offices of the State Government, where, the
Central Government or, as the case may be, the State Government is the
principal employer.
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DEFINITIONS UNDER
THE CODE
SECTION 2 (W) OF THE CODE
 MEANING OF FACTORY

"factory" means any premises

including the precincts thereof—

(i) whereon 20 or more ii) whereon 40 or more

workers are working, or were workers are working, or were
working on any day of the working on any day of the
preceding twelve months, preceding twelve months,,

For Carrying For Carrying

manufacturing process manufacturing process

with the aid of without the

power aid of power,
 BUT FACTORY DOES NOT
INCLUDE

• a mobile unit belonging to the armed forces of the

Union,
• a railway running shed or
• a hotel, restaurant or eating place
Precincts are usually understood as a space
enclosed by walls or fences.
The expression premises including precincts envisages premises
which have precincts and those which might not have precincts.
 Concept of Factory

● Factory means any premises including precincts.

● Precincts are usually understood as a space enclosed by walls or fences.
● The expression premises including precincts envisages premises which have
precincts and those which might not have precincts.
● The word including is not a term restricting the meaning of the word
premises but is a term that enlarges its scope.
● Where premises are lands they would have no precincts.
● Therefore, lands would be deemed to be included in the premises and such lands in
which a process of manufacture (salt work) is carried on would be deemed to be a
factory. (State of Bombay v. Ardeshir Hormusji Bhiwandiwala, 1956)
● In order to cover an establishment under the expression factory it is not necessary
that the manufacturing process must be carried on the whole of the building,
place or premises but it is sufficient for the purposes if the manufacturing
process is being carried on in any part of that establishment.
Manufacturing
Process
(S. 2 zi)
 Manufacturing process means any process for—
(i) making, altering, repairing, ornamenting, finishing, packing, oiling, washing, cleaning,
breaking up, demolishing, or otherwise treating or adapting any article or substance with a view to
its use, sale, transport, delivery or disposal; or

( ii) pumping oil, water, sewage or any other substance; or

(iii) generating, transforming or transmitting power; or

(iv) composing, printing, printing by letter press, lithography, offset, photogravure screen
printing, three Dimensional or four Dimensional printing, prototyping, flexography or other types of
printing process or book binding; or

(v) constructing, reconstructing, repairing, refitting, finishing or breaking up ships or vessels; or

(vi) preserving or storing any article in cold storage; or

(vii) such other processes as the Central Government may notify;

CASE LAWS
 Indraprastha medical corp. v. NCT Delhi Index

(2006)

 The question before the court was whether a hospital comes under 01
the definition of factory?
 A hospital providing medical treatment to people suffering from diseases 02
is not a factory u/s. 2(m) of factories act read with s. 2(k).
 The main work of hospital was not making, altering repairing etc.
03
 It was not one in which articles were produced or adopted.
 Its activities of cleaning, washing, preserving articles in cold storage etc.
Were only incidental. 04
 It was held that only main activity of establishment has to be seen in
order to bring the establishment under the definition of factory. 05
 V.P GOPALA RAO V. PUBLIC PROSECUTOR, ANDHRA Index

PRADESH (AIR 1970 SC66):

 FACTS: 01
 Ms. Golden tobacco pvt. ltd. had their head office and main factory at Bombay where
they manufactured cigarettes.
 The appellant was occupier and manager of the company’s premises at eluru in 02
Andhra Pradesh where sun-cured country tobacco purchased from the local
producers was collected , processed and stored then transported to the company’s
03
factory at Bombay.
 The question before the supreme court in appeal was whether the company’s
premises in Andhra Pradesh constituted factory within the meaning of section 04
2(m) of the factories act.
 The material on record had shown that in company's premises in ap sun cured tobacco
leaves were subjected to the process of moistening, stripping and packing. 05
 Index

01
Held:
 The court considered the definition of factory contained in section
02
2(m) of the act and held that manufacturing process were carried
on in the premises.
 The definition was widely worded. 03
 The moistening was an adaptation of the tobacco leaves. All these
processes were manufacturing process. 04

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 Index
Uttaranchal Forest Development Corporation
V. Jabar Singh And Others (2007)
01
 The SC considered the definition of factory and manufacturing process as
contained in section 2(m) and 2(k) of the factories act.
 It observed: cutting trees by axe and changing the shape of the timber into 02
logs by using hand-driven saw both fall within the definition of the first part
of manufacturing process as ‘cutting’ would be included in the process of 03
making and breaking up included in the said definition.
 Lastly the conversion of trees into logs is admittedly for the purposes of
04
sale, disposal, use and last but not the least for transport all of which fall

within the third part of the definition.

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 Index

Hotel New Nalanda v. Regional Director, ESI corp. ( 2010)

01
 It was observed by the SC that for holding an establishment to be a
factory it must first be established that some work or process is carried
02
on in any part of the establishment that amounts to manufacturing
process as defined under section 2(k) of the factories act, 1948.
 Further the use of power in the manufacturing process should be direct 03
and proximate.
 The expression “manufacturing process” being carried on with the aid of
04
power doesn’t mean a very indirect application of power such as use
of electric bulb for providing light in the work area.
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 Index

01
 Unless the links are established, that is to say, it is shown that
some process or work is carried on in establishment which 02
qualifies manufacturing process, the mere presence of a
refrigerator and a grinder even though connected to the main
03
power line may not necessarily lead to the inference that the
establishment is a factory.
04

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 Prabhulal Potadia Vs. State (1966 CriLJ228) Index

Facts:
01
 The inspector of factories along with the chief inspector of factories inspected
a brick kiln at about 8 am
 They found a number of persons working in 2 kilns which were actually in 02
operation and the smoke was coming out of six chimneys provided in the
kilns. 03
 They also found a 5 horse power diesel engine pump working for supplying
water to the process.
04
 pump was being used for pumping water to the molding section.
 About 50 workers, men, women and children were found working in the field.
They ascertained that the usual number of workers employed were about 300. 05
 Index

01
 During the time of their inspection, they found six workers were
charging coal into the kiln, three were unloading sand from truck,
02
three were carrying sand to the moulding section and several
other workers were found engaged in other miscellaneous work.
 The Inspector of Factories found the kiln to be a 'factory' within 03
the meaning of the Indian Factories Act, 1948, but the same was
being run without registration' and without obtaining a licence. 04

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 Held: Index

 A 5 H. P. Diesel engine pump was engaged in supplying water to the manufacturing

process of bricks. The pump was being used for pumping water to the molding
01
section.
 Thus, it cannot be doubted that the aid of power was taken in supplying water
to the manufacturing process of bricks. 02
 In the present case the prosecution has been able to prove that the kiln in
question is a factory within the meaning of the act, as the essential element,
03
that is, the premises were being used for a manufacturing process and the
requisite number of workers were engaged in such process and that the
relationship of the employer and the employee existed 04
 Though a factory within the meaning of the act, was admittedly run without
registration and without written approval of the chief inspector or factories.
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THANK YOU