Lawfully Yours: By Retd Justice K Chandru | Companies circumventing overtime laws; outsourced labour, gig workers most hit

Companies circumventing overtime laws; outsourced labour, gig workers most hit

According to some studies, India has one of the most overworked populations globally, crossing 45 hours of average working hours per week. With some companies defending or considering increasing the workday to 14 hours, with only a single day off per week, all the efforts put in to regulate the workday to 8 hours have been successfully undone by capitalist-minded companies. With India copying the existing capitalist model with all its flaws, the country's labour policy is expected to worsen. What legal remedies are available to protect the labour force from such exploitation?

-- B Ramalingam, Chennai

Even when the British were ruling India, they didn't do much about labour laws. It was only after British India was made an independent member of the International Labour Organization (ILO) that a few labour legislations were introduced. But it was the revised Factory Act 1948 which fixed eight hours per day as the maximum period of work with intervals. The shops and commercial establishments laws enacted by different states made them applicable to white-collar jobs. Companies now want to dilute this in the name of overtime wages, etc. Anyhow, it was only after the liberalisation of the economy that the regulatory laws came under threat. United resistance also saw the Tamil Nadu government dropping its proposal to amend the law for maximum work days last year. But today it is the outsourced labour and gig workers who do not have the benefit of these restrictions.

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Not much done to address rising challenges in tackling cybercrime

Cybercriminals are using all means to steal people's personal information and other crucial data to indulge in financial fraud. Most of these calls, in which scammers impersonate government officials, law enforcement, or family members to trick people into sharing financial information or making payments, are being made from countries like Yemen, Oman, the Caribbean Netherlands, Miami, and Syria. Why can't telecom providers screen such dubious calls and save the hapless victims? Is there any government policy to this effect? Will our legal system be able to intervene and instruct the telecom companies to bring in a check?

-- Arun Aravind, Madhavaram, Chennai

Cybercrimes are growing at a blazing pace. Even the Prime Minister had to speak about the fake digital arrest threats and ransom monies being extracted from the gullible. Enough has not been done in tackling cybercrimes and phone fraud. It is not clear as to why people succumb to such empty promises/threats. They do not even call their friends or the police. More often it is after the loss of substantial amounts to these unknown cyber criminals that they come out in the open and share their sob stories. Immediate consultation with informed sources would have alerted them. This attitude makes one realise that these gullible victims have also their seamier side to their case.