Bill to enhance working overtime hours introduced in LS

It seeks to maximise the limit of overtime hours from 50 hours to 100 hours per quarter

A Bill seeking enhancement of working overtime hours upto 100 per quarter was allowed to be introduced in Lok Sabha by Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, despite objections by Opposition members.

The Factories (Amendment) Bill, 2016, introduced by Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya, seeks to maximise the limit of overtime hours from 50 hours to 100 hours per quarter.

It also empowers the central government, in addition to the state governments, to make exempting rules and orders in respect of total number of hours of work on overtime in a quarter, which would ensure uniformity in its application by various state governments and Union Territories.

Raising objections, Sankar Prasad Dutta said the provisions of the Bill were similar to the one introduced in 2014 which was before the Standing Committee.

N K Premachandran (RSP) said the Bill was encroaching upon the rights of the states and was against the federal structure of the country.

Dattatreya said bill was not against the interests of labour as the International labour Organisation has prescribed the upper limit of 144 hours.

The minister also denied that the Bill was taking away the powers of the states.