Labour Ministry sees highest filing of grievances in 2025, shows data

The Labour Ministry accounted for the highest share of grievances filed with the Centre in 2025 till November, driven mainly by EPFO-related complaints, according to DARPG data

The Ministry of Labour and Employment saw the highest filing of grievances in 2025 till November, with a share of 15.5 per cent of total grievances filed with the government, up from 8.4 per cent in the same period in 2024, according to data from the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG).

 

During the first 11 months of 2025, the labour ministry received 231,786 grievances, followed by the Department of Financial Services (Banking Division) with 170,704 and the Department of Telecommunications with 81,258 grievances.

 

For most months of 2025, the labour ministry had the highest volume of grievances received. Historically, the labour ministry has remained among the top five ministries or departments in terms of volume of grievances, an analysis of the DARPG data showed. These generally include grievances related to provident fund (PF) withdrawal, pensions or wages, with most grievances being filed with the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO).

   

In 2024, the labour ministry ranked second in terms of the number of grievances received, while the Department of Rural Development ranked first. From January to June 2025, 29.3 per cent of grievances to the labour ministry were about EPFO, the highest among all categories. This data is not available for subsequent months.

 

“This reflects the vulnerability in our system of social security. A major problem with our workforce is that a large part of it is informal, where most employers hire workers on a contractual basis. Most times, employers do not have direct contact with the workers. They rely on contractors, who often claim they are contributing to social security for workers when they actually do not. In my understanding, most of these grievances are due to such non-payments of social security,” said Abhay Tilak, director and secretary at the Indian School of Political Economy.

 

The DARPG operates under the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions and prepares these monthly reports through the Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS). CPGRAMS is an online platform for people to lodge complaints about government services. It is a single portal connected to all ministries and departments under the central government and the states. Grievances can be filed by any citizen, pensioner, government employee, organisation or association.

 

Due to the high volume of grievances being filed with the labour ministry, both the number of disposed cases and pending cases was the highest for the labour ministry between January 1 and November 30, 2025, the data showed. The number of disposed cases from January through November was 226,943, with a disposal rate of 95 per cent. The number of pending cases in the same period was 11,832, with a pendency rate of nearly 5 per cent.

 

This comes amid major reforms being brought forward by the labour ministry in 2025, including the enforcement of four new labour codes and the announcement of EPFO 3.0. These reforms aim to enable easier withdrawal of EPF balances and expand social security coverage, including for people working in the gig work sector.

 

On May 20, 2025, the DARPG conducted a live session in collaboration with the labour ministry to address EPFO-related grievances received on the CPGRAMS portal, according to the May 2025 report.