AICCTU demands govt to enforce laws mandating 48-hrs work per week

India ranks seventh globally for having one of the hardest working labour forces in terms of average working hours, the association said
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Following remarks by SN Subrahmanyan, Chairman of L&T (Larsen & Toubro), advocating for a 90-hour work week, including Sundays, the Karnataka chapter of the All India Central Council of Trade Unions (AICCTU) strongly condemned the statement.

The union called on the government to enforce laws mandating a 48-hour work week, prevented forced overtime, and take necessary actions to safeguard the health, rights, and dignity of workers, stated a report by The New Indian Express.

The association pointed out that corporations have unlawfully normalised 12-hour work shifts, especially for contract workers. AICCTU referenced India’s legally established eight-hour workday, introduced through the 1946 Amendment to the Factories Act of 1934.

They emphasised the glaring disparity in the CEO-worker wage gap in India, highlighting that in large corporations, CEOs earn 500 to 800 times the median employee salary. For instance, the chairman of L&T earned a salary of Rs 51 crore in 2023-24, which is 534.57 times the median salary of the company’s employees, they pointed out.

AICCTU said that prolonged working hours have been linked to various health issues, including cognitive anxiety, musculoskeletal disorders, sleep disturbances, and heightened stress levels. The resulting fatigue extends its impact to other organs, disrupting the neuromuscular system.

This leads to reduced sensory perception, diminished attention span, muscle weakness, irregular or reduced heartbeat, altered glandular secretions, and dilation of blood vessels, according to a report by The New Indian Express.

India ranks seventh globally for having one of the hardest working labour forces in terms of average working hours, the association said and reflected at the ILO report, as per which Indians are set to have the longest average workweek in 2023 among the world’s ten largest economies.

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