Law giving workers right to ignore after-hours calls introduced in Indian parliament

Bill would make it illegal for employers to demand responses outside official hours or on holidays

A new bill introduced in India’s parliament has proposed giving workers the legal right to ignore phone calls, emails and messages from their bosses after office hours, sparking a debate over the country’s work culture.

The proposal, tabled by opposition member of parliament Supriya Sule, comes amid growing concerns over long working hours, burnout, and a digital work culture that often expects employees to be available late into the night. India has one of the world’s longest statutory work weeks at 48 hours, and surveys consistently show some of the highest levels of overwork and stress among major economies.

The bill would make it illegal for employers to demand responses outside official hours or on holidays, and would prohibit disciplinary action against staff who do not reply. It would also apply to all forms of communication, including phone calls, texts, emails, and video calls.

Under the proposal, companies and employees would need to agree to clear rules on what constitutes an emergency, while organisations that repeatedly violate the law could face fines of 1 per cent of their total employee wage bill. Workers who choose to work beyond scheduled hours would be entitled to overtime pay at the standard rate.

Ms Sule said the legislation is aimed at addressing the growing “culture of constant availability” created by digital tools. The bill cites research linking after-hours work pressure to sleep deprivation, chronic stress, emotional exhaustion and ‘telepressure’, the compulsion to respond instantly, as well as what it calls “info-obesity”, the sense of being overwhelmed by a constant stream of messages.

A similar version of the bill was proposed by Ms Sule in 2019 but did not advance. The renewed effort reflects shifting attitudes globally, as several countries, including France, Spain and Portugal, have moved to restrict after-hours communication in the name of worker well-being.

Several countries have already introduced versions of a legal right to disconnect, mostly in Europe. France was the first to adopt such a rule in 2017, requiring larger companies to negotiate policies that limit emails and calls outside working hours.

Spain and Italy followed with similar legislation, giving employees the right to ignore after-hours messages without repercussions. Portugal went further in 2021, banning employers from contacting staff outside office hours except in emergencies and requiring companies to cover higher household energy bills for home-workers.

Urban white-collar sectors in India, particularly IT, finance, consulting and outsourcing, are known for late-night shifts, extended working hours and expectations of permanent availability, partly due to time-zone alignment with Europe and the US.

As a result, millions of Indian workers often take work calls late into the evening, respond to messages on weekends, and struggle to maintain boundaries between professional and personal time. The rise of remote and hybrid work since the pandemic has also added to this problem.

Debates over how much Indians should work have intensified in recent years as attitude towards work-life balance changes and clashes with older beliefs. Earlier this year, Infosys founder and Rishi Sunak’s billionaire father-in-law Narayan Murthy urged young people to put in a 70-hour work week to help accelerate the country’s growth, triggering a backlash from workers’ groups, health experts and many corporate employees.

The bill has once again opened a wider debate in India about digital rights, mental health and whether the country’s labour laws – many of which date back decades – are equipped for modern workplaces.

Some users on X shared how their workplaces expected them to be available even at midnight. “My ex-boss would text or call me at 2AM, 3AM, 4AM, or 5AM and expect me to go to the factory,” wrote one user while talking about the bill.

“If this Bill becomes law, it might be the biggest mental-health win of this decade,” wrote another X user, Ashish Kumar.

Ms Sule has also introduced separate private member bills proposing paid paternity leave for fathers and stronger protections for gig workers, signalling a push towards more progressive labour reforms in a country with a vast informal workforce and limited social protections.

The government has not indicated whether it will support the right-to-disconnect proposal, and private member bills rarely become law in India. But the move has drawn significant public attention, reflecting growing pressure to regulate a work culture in which personal time is often consumed by office demands.