Safeguarding Inter-State Migrant Workers: A 1979 Legislative Overview

Every year, millions of workers leave their home states – from Bihar to Delhi, from Odisha to Gujarat, from Jharkhand to Maharashtra – to work on construction sites, in factories, and on large infrastructure projects. They are often illiterate, unfamiliar with local languages, and entirely dependent on contractors who recruited them. For decades, this dependence was ruthlessly exploited. It was this reality that pushed Parliament to enact the Inter-State Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1979 – a dedicated law to protect workers who cross state borders for work.

Why was a separate law needed? 🔗

Before 1979, inter-state migrant workers were loosely covered under the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970. But a 1977 government inquiry, called the Compact Committee, found that the malpractices by contractors – locally known as Sardars or Khatadars – were far too varied and severe to be addressed by that law alone. The Compact Committee, constituted in February 1977, recommended the enactment of a separate central legislation to regulate the employment of inter-state migrant workmen, as it was felt that the provisions of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970, even after necessary amendments, would not adequately address the variety of malpractices indulged in by contractors.

The Inter-State Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Bill, 1979 was passed by both Houses of Parliament and received presidential assent on 11th June 1979. The law was a direct response to decades of documented exploitation – wage theft, forced labour, dangerous conditions, and no legal recourse for workers hundreds of kilometres from home.

Who does the Act cover? 🔗

The Act extends to the whole of India and applies to every establishment in which five or more inter-state migrant workmen are employed or were employed on any day of the preceding twelve months, and to every contractor who employed five or more interstate migrant workers on any day of the preceding twelve months.

The definition of an inter-state migrant workman is specific: any person who is recruited by or through a contractor in one state under an agreement or other arrangement for employment in an establishment in another state, whether or not with the knowledge of the principal employer. This is an important legal distinction – it places the burden of compliance on contractors, not just the primary business owners who benefit from the migrant labour.

Registration and licensing: the regulatory backbone 🔗

The Act creates a two-tier compliance structure involving both the principal employer and the contractor.

Registration of establishments 🔗

The Act provides for registration of establishments employing inter-state migrant workmen. No principal employer of an establishment to which the Act applies can employ inter-state migrant workmen unless a certificate of registration is in force. Deputy Labour Commissioners are typically appointed as registering officers under the Act for their respective areas.

Licensing of contractors 🔗

Every contractor who recruits workers from one state for employment in another must obtain a licence. When applying for a licence, the contractor must use the prescribed form, providing details about the establishment’s location and the nature of the work for which inter-state migrant workmen are to be employed. The licence can also specify conditions around work hours, wages, and amenities. If a contractor violates the terms of the licence or the provisions of the Act, the licensing officer has the power to revoke the licence after giving the holder an opportunity to be heard.

The pass-book: a worker’s most important document 🔗

One of the most practical protections the Act introduced was the mandatory issuance of a pass-book to every inter-state migrant worker. The Act provides for the issuance of a pass-book to every inter-state migrant workman with full details – covering their identity, the terms of their employment, the wages agreed upon, and the work they are engaged to do. This pass-book served as both an identity document and a record of entitlements, ensuring the worker had documentary proof of their agreed terms in a state where they may know nobody and speak a different language.

Financial entitlements under the Act 🔗

Beyond the basics of registration and documentation, the Act created specific monetary entitlements that no contractor could legally withhold.

Equal wages and minimum wage guarantee 🔗

Inter-state migrant workmen must be paid equal wages if they perform similar work as others in an establishment. In all other cases, they must be paid at least the minimum rate of wages. This provision was critical because migrant workers were routinely paid below local rates, with contractors pocketing the difference.

Displacement allowance 🔗

Being uprooted from one’s home state to work elsewhere carries real costs – financial and personal. The Act acknowledged this directly. The displacement allowance payable to an inter-state migrant workman must be equivalent to 50% of monthly wages or Rs. 75, whichever is higher. This one-time payment is made at the time of recruitment, before the worker even reaches the destination state.

Journey allowance 🔗

Inter-state migrant workmen are entitled to a travel allowance equal to the fare from their home to the workplace in another state. The contractor must pay for both the outward and return journeys, and the workmen shall be paid wages as if they were on duty during travel. This meant that travel time was not unpaid dead time – it was treated as working time.

Other welfare entitlements 🔗

Additional entitlements under the Act include suitable residential accommodation, medical facilities, and protective clothing, as well as equal pay for equal work irrespective of sex. Female migrant workers also had specific protections – under the Central Rules framed under this Act, no female migrant workman shall be employed by any contractor before 6 a.m. or after 7 p.m. , with limited exceptions.

Enforcement mechanism and penalties 🔗

The Act empowered governments to appoint inspectors who could enter premises, examine workers, and inspect registers and employment records to verify compliance. The principal employers and contractors are required to maintain registers and other records giving particulars of inter-state migrant workmen employed, the nature of jobs performed, and the rate of wages paid to them.

Penalties for violations were built into the Act. Whoever contravenes any provisions of this Act or of any rules made thereunder regulating the employment of inter-state migrant workmen, or contravenes any condition of a licence, shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine, or with both. In the case of a continuing contravention, an additional fine may extend to one hundred rupees for every day during which such contravention continues after the first conviction.

The enforcement gap: where the law fell short 🔗

On paper, the 1979 Act was comprehensive. In practice, it was poorly implemented for most of its existence. Since the stipulations of this Act are not implemented in true spirit by the state governments, more and more interstate workers are deployed in miserable working conditions at wages far below the prevailing local wages. The vested interest of labour departments in collusion with principal employers and contractors is the main stumbling block to implementing this Act.

The problem was structural. Most inter-state migrants face challenges of meager wages, adverse employment conditions, inadequate onsite living conditions, and almost absent social protection. Workers were often unaware of their legal entitlements. Even the existing labour laws provide certain benefits to informal workers in general, but most of them are unaware of these provisions. Information asymmetry and digital access are assumed to be in place, but the state of the labour market is quite different.

The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 exposed just how deep this failure ran. Millions of migrant workers were stranded without wages, food, or transport – a direct consequence of decades of inadequate registration and documentation. One of the main reasons for the chaos and suffering of migrant workers during the lockdown was that there was no comprehensive information on the number of interstate migrants and their states of origin. While the 1979 Act also contained several provisions requiring such registration, it was, in general, an abysmally implemented law.

From the 1979 Act to the OSH Code, 2020 🔗

The 1979 Act was formally subsumed into the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions (OSH) Code, 2020. The new Code broadened the definition of migrant workers to include those who migrate on their own – not just those recruited through contractors – which was a significant gap in the 1979 framework. The legal framework protecting inter-state migrant workers in India has evolved substantially from the enactment of the Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act, 1979, through landmark judicial interpretations, to the recent consolidation under the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020.

The new Code also introduced Aadhaar-based digital registration, a toll-free helpline for grievances, and portability of benefits across states. However, this Code remains largely ineffective due to the lack of clarity on enforcement, incomplete rule-making by states, opposition from labour segments and trade unions, and concerns about the potential impact on businesses. The threshold for applicability was also raised from five workers to ten – a step that may exclude small establishments from the scope of regulation, potentially leaving some migrant workers without statutory protection.

The 1979 Act, for all its limitations in enforcement, established the foundational legal principle that a worker does not lose rights simply by crossing a state boundary. That principle – contested and under-enforced as it has been – remains the bedrock of India’s migrant labour law. The challenge, then and now, is not the existence of protective legislation, but building the institutional will and administrative machinery to make it work for the people it was designed to protect.

What do you think? If the 1979 Act had all the right provisions on paper – licensing, pass-books, displacement allowance, journey allowance – why did enforcement fail so comprehensively for four decades? And given that the OSH Code, 2020 faces similar implementation challenges, what structural changes would actually make a difference for migrant workers on the ground?

References

1. https://clc.gov.in/clc/acts-rules/inter-state-migrant-workmen
2. https://www.indiacode.nic.in/handle/123456789/1750?view_type=browse
3. https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=1911143