Karnataka government will reconsider 12-hour workday law brought by BJP, says CM Siddaramaiah

The Karnataka government will consider revoking a labour law that facilitates 12-hour workdays and will revert to the previously prescribed eight-hour workdays at establishments in the state, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has said.
Siddaramaiah made the assurance during a meeting held on Thursday with a delegation of leaders of the Samyukta Horata-Karnataka Forum featuring farmers, Dalits, labour leaders, students and women groups.
Trade union activists have been demanding the revoking of the Factories (Karnataka Amendment) Bill, 2023, passed by the previous BJP government in February 2023 which allowed establishments to have 12-hour workdays instead of eight-hour workdays.
Advertisement
On Thursday, Siddaramaiah told the Samyukta Horata Karnataka delegation that he would check the legal position under the law and would “review and reduce it to eight hours as before”.
In February 2023, the Karnataka legislature passed an amendment to the Factories Act of 1948 in its application in the state to allow industries to extend working hours for labour up to 12 hours a day – while keeping the maximum weekly work hours at 48.
The Factories (Karnataka Amendment) Bill, 2023 was passed without a debate in the Legislative Assembly by the BJP but was opposed by the Congress, JDS, and even a member of the BJP in the Legislative Council when the law was passed on February 24 amid a walkout.
According to the statement of reasons in the bill, the changes in working hours are necessary to “create more economic activities and employment opportunities”.
Advertisement
The law allows the state “to increase the number of hours of work from the existing nine hours up to twelve hours inclusive of rest intervals in any day, subject to a maximum of 48 hours in any week”. It also allows the state “to extend the total number of hours of work by a worker without an interval to six hours to any group or class or description of factories to facilitate the increase in the daily maximum hours of work”.
It allows the state “to prescribe the hours of work in any day or in any week above which wages at the rate of twice the rate of ordinary in respect of overtime work is payable to a worker in respect of overtime work” and lets “factories to engage workers on overtime for an increased period of time in a quarter to deal with an exceptional press of work”.
The IT/BT minister in the then BJP government, Dr C N Ashwathnarayan, told the Legislative Council that the extension of working hours was being done to provide a boost to manufacturing where India is lagging behind China.
Advertisement
The amended law allows overtime to extend from 75 hours in three months to 145 hours in three months and also allows women to work night shifts with adequate security.
“Now the rule is that workers should work for 48 hours and the aim is to reduce work from six days a week to four or five and in a total week the work still remains at 48 hours. In the case of those working for 10 hours a day, the workers will work for five days a week and those who work for eight hours a day will work for six days a week,” Ashwathnarayan said in 2023.
The bill was opposed as anti-labour by BJP MLC and former MP Ayyanur Manjunath among others. “This will be an anti-labour law if it is generalised and it must be specified as being applicable to a particular sector. Unfortunately, it was not discussed in the Vidhan Sabha, there were no discussions with trade unions and it is slavery to exploit workers for 12 hours in a day,” Manjunath had argued in the council.
Then law minister J C Madhuswamy had argued that the government was not making it compulsory for industries to impose 12-hour work days. “It is not a compulsory law and it is a flexible law. Manpower in industries is low in the country. The maximum hours remain at 48 hours a week. We have not mandated any industry. We are facilitating agreements between industry and labour. It is as per the law but if someone wants to work 12 hours it can be done,” he said.
The revoking of the 12-hour work clause in the Factories Act is among several demands of trade unions and groups like the Samyukta Horata Karnataka. The group on Thursday also sought changes in land acquisition laws and cow slaughter prohibition brought by the BJP.
Advertisement
Siddaramaiah assured the association that the government would consider their demands as per law.

This data comes from MediaIntel.Asia's Media Intelligence and Media Monitoring Platform.