Indian labour law : Constitutional Rights.

Date : 25.03.2019

Indian labour law : Constitutional Rights.

In the Constitution of India from 1950, articles 14-16, 19(1)(c), 23-24, 38, and 41-43A directly concern labour rights.

• Article 14 states everyone should be equal before the law, 

• Article 15 specifically says the state should not discriminate against citizens, and 

• Article 16 extends a right of "equality of opportunity" for employment or appointment under the state. 

• Article 19(1)(c) gives everyone a specific right "to form associations or unions". 

• Article 23 prohibits all trafficking and forced labour

• Article 24 prohibits child labour under 14 years old in a factory, mine or "any other hazardous employment".

Articles 38-39, and 41-43A, however, like all rights listed in Part IV of the Constitution are not enforceable by courts, rather than creating an aspirational "duty of the State to apply these principles in making laws". 

The original justification for leaving such principles unenforceable by the courts was that democratically accountable institutions ought to be left with discretion, given the demands they could create on the state for funding from general taxation, although such views have since become controversial. 

• Article 38(1) says that in general the state should "strive to promote the welfare of the people" with a "social order in which justice, social, economic and political, shall inform all the institutions of national life. 

• Article 38(2) : it goes on to say the state should "minimise the inequalities in income" and based on all other statuses. 

• Article 41 creates a "right to work", which the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 attempts to put into practice. 

• Article 42 requires the state to "make provision for securing just and human conditions of work and for maternity relief". 

• Article 43 says workers should have the right to a living wage and "conditions of work ensuring a decent standard of life". 

• Article 43A, inserted by the Forty-second Amendment of the Constitution of India in 1976, creates a constitutional right to codetermination by requiring the state to legislate to "secure the participation of workers in the management of undertakings".

Ch.Laxmi narayana