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NASSCOM FEEDBACK ON DRAFT TELANGANA GIG AND PLATFORM WORKERS (REGISTRATION, SOCIAL SECURITY AND WELFARE) ACT, 2025
NASSCOM FEEDBACK ON DRAFT TELANGANA GIG AND PLATFORM WORKERS (REGISTRATION, SOCIAL SECURITY AND WELFARE) ACT, 2025

May 1, 2025

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Nasscom as part of its ongoing advocacy at the state level (Rajasthan, Karnataka, Jharkhand, Haryana) on legislative proposals for social security and welfare of platform based gig workers submitted a detailed feedback to the state government of Telangana. On April 14, the Government of Telangana released a draft law for social welfare of platform-based gig workers for industry feedback. While nasscom duly acknowledges the importance of social security and welfare of gig workers, we highlighted the need to address certain key issues in the Draft Bill for its smooth operation and to ensure that the industry is not disproportionately burdened. Please refer the attached file containing our detailed submission.

Some of our major recommendations are:  

1. Sunset Clause

The objective of the Draft Bill is to provide social security for gig and platform workers. This substantially overlaps with the intent and scope of Code on Social Security (CoSS), 2020 which already recognises gig and platform workers as a separate beneficiary class eligible for centralised social protection. Once CoSS is implemented, it will establish a uniform national framework for the provision, funding and administration of such social security benefits. We recommended inserting a sunset provision under Section 1 of the Bill to automatically repeal the Telangana Act once the CoSS comes into force. This will avoid regulatory overlap and ensure gig and platform workers are uniformly covered under a single, nationally coordinated framework.

Further, once the CoSS is implemented, the state government being the appropriate government would perform a vital role with respect to social security and welfare of gig and platform workers. To elaborate, in 2022, the Telangana State Government released the draft Telangana CoSS Rules, 2022, which provides that it is the responsibility of the State Government to register gig workers along with duty to prescribe conditions of registration for providing them access to social security schemes.

2. Onerous obligations

The Draft Bill lays down certain obligations on aggregators which need modifications to accommodate the functioning of the gig platforms. These include minimum notice period for termination, automated monitoring and decision-making systems, monitoring and tracking mechanism (Welfare Fund Fee Verification System). Our feedback suggested specific changes to make these obligations compatible, without compromising on the intended objectives.

3. Alignment of Definitions with CoSS

The present definitions of "aggregator," "gig worker," and "platform worker" in the Bill are not aligned with CoSS. We recommended an alignment to help maintain consistency and legal clarity. It will also ensure the Telangana law integrates smoothly with central schemes and avoids confusion among stakeholders.

4. Protecting Data Privacy and Commercial Confidentiality

The Bill must explicitly safeguard personal data and commercially sensitive information by avoiding broad data-sharing requirements. This may be achieved by shifting to periodic audited reporting instead of sharing sensitive data related to payments etc. This should meet the objective of transparency while ensuring that the platforms are not required to share confidential/sensitive data.

5. Standardisation of Unique Identifier

The Universal Account Number (UAN) generated through the e-Shram portal by the Ministry of Labour and Employment serves as a pan-India identifier linked to government IDs and social security schemes. Creating a separate state-specific ID without integrating e-Shram would fragment databases and undermine the registration efforts already made by gig workers. The e-Shram UAN should be adopted as the sole unique identifier for gig workers in Telangana instead of creating a new ID.

6. Improving Grievance Redressal Mechanism

We recommended replacing the Grievance Redressal Officer with a multi-member Grievance Redressal Committee to strengthen the redress function and to enhance impartiality and efficiency. A committee structure should enable diverse representation and strengthen stakeholder trust in dispute resolution.

7. Balanced Approach to Penalties

The proposed liability of imprisonment appears to be overly stringent given that there are monetary penalties provided in the draft. At a time when both central and state laws are looking at decriminalisation, which is the cornerstone of labour reforms in the country, the current Draft Bill should not introduce criminal liability.

8. Flexibility in Eligibility for Social Security Benefits

At present, the Bill ties gig workers’ access to general and specific social security schemes based on contributions made by them subject to minimum number of transactions/gig work undertaken. This could have an exclusionary effect and limit the scope of coverage of such schemes. In other words, access to social and welfare schemes should be available irrespective of the number of minimum transactions. This ensures that essential protections against accident, death, etc is provided from the first transaction.

9. Alternative to Welfare Fund Fee Verification System (WFFVS)

Section 20 proposes an onerous obligation on aggregators to map every transaction onto a WFFVS. Given the volume, frequency, and dynamic nature of transactions on digital platforms, real-time integration with a government system would be highly complex, costly, and incompatible with diverse aggregator business models. More importantly, this requirement does not appear to be essential to meet the intended purpose.

The proposal, in addition to avoidable technical effort, requires sharing of transaction level data which is proprietary and commercially sensitive in nature to the Board. The issue is further complicated as the Board comprises of both government and non-government representatives. As an alternative, we suggest replacing WFFVS with a self-attested, duly audited periodic declaration confirming welfare fund fee deposits. This approach should balance transparency, regulatory compliance, and operational practicality.

 

Should you have any queries on the above submission, please write to sudipto@nasscom.in or swapnil@nasscom.in with a copy to policy@nasscom.in. 


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20250428_nasscom_feedback_Telangana_Gig_Workers_Bill.pdf

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