The Factories Act of 1948 is India’s well-known Social Security Act, and it regulates working conditions in all sorts of manufacturing companies that fulfil the description of “factory.”
The current version of the Factories Act of 1948 was enacted on September 23, 1948, and has been in effect in India since April 1, 1949.
The purpose of the Act is as follows:
To protect the safety and well-being of workers on the job
To govern women’s, young people’s, and children’s employment.
To ensure, among other things, that proper working hours, leave, and overtime are adhered to.
There are a few “Terminologies” that must be known before the law can be fully comprehended.
“Adult” refers to someone who has reached the age of eighteen;
“Adolescent” refers to someone who has reached the age of fifteen but has not yet reached the age of eighteen.
“child” means a person who has not completed his fifteenth year of age;
Calendar year” refers to the twelve-month period that begins on January 1st of each year;
“competent person”, in relation to any provision of this Act, means a person or an institution recognized as such by the Chief Inspector for the purposes of carrying out tests, examinations and inspections required to be done in a factory under the provisions of this Act
“hazardous process” means any process or activity in relation to an industry specified in the First Schedule where, unless special care is taken, raw materials used therein or the intermediate or finished products, bye-products, wastes or effluents
“young person” means a person who is either a child or an adolescent;
Structure of the Act:
This Law consists of 120 Acts & 3 Schedules
First Schedule: List of Industries involving Hazardous Processes
Second Schedule: Permissible Levels of Certain Chemical Substances in Work Environment
Third Schedule: Notifiable Diseases