Gig worker rights stuck in draft mode

The Karnataka government’s Draft Platform-Based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Rules, 2025, intended to clarify and operationalise its parent law -- the groundbreaking Karnataka Platform-Based Gig Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Ordinance, 2025 -- has recently been released for public comment. Far from providing clarity and delivering on the promise of rights and protections for gig workers, these draft rules leave critical questions unanswered and risk reducing the landmark legislation to a post-dated cheque -- a deferred promise with little present value.

At the heart of the Ordinance is a welfare fee to fund welfare schemes for gig and platform workers across the state. But neither the Ordinance nor the new rules specifies what the rate of that fee will be. The Ordinance merely states that the state government shall fix the ‘tax rate’ anywhere between 1 and 5% of the payout on each transaction. Worryingly, rather than providing a specific rate, the draft rules defer this decision, undermining the transparency and certainty necessary for any welfare regime. More egregiously, the draft rules are conspicuously silent on the welfare benefits workers will be entitled to. This responsibility has been delegated to the Gig Workers Welfare Board (Welfare Board), with no minimum standards set out. Without a defined fee structure or clear benefits, the purpose of the Ordinance -- the extension of social security for gig workers as an entitlement --may not be effectively realised.

A promising aspects of the Ordinance was its requirement that platforms enter into “fair contracts” with workers. These contracts were meant to be “transparent and comprehensive”, including “fair terms of piece and/or time rate norms”. Workers were to have the right to refuse offered tasks. It was expected that this statutory promise of ‘fair contracts’ would be fleshed out in the rules. Yet, the draft rules provide no meaningful guidance on what constitutes fairness in practice, nor do they define principles for payment rates or regulate deductions.

Similarly, while the Ordinance calls for “reasonable working conditions”, including rest periods and access to sanitary facilities, the rules offer no concrete standards. Although the Ordinance envisages sector-specific occupational safety and health standards, the draft rules leave such standards to be determined in future bylaws.

By failing to define the content of these statutory provisions, the draft rules risk turning these guaranteed rights into little more than a rope of sand. Instead, they should have reinforced the Ordinance’s recognition of fairness in payment by mandating that payment cannot be fall below the applicable minimum wage. Judicial precedents establish that any payment below minimum wage cannot qualify as “fair terms of piece and/or time rate norms”. Likewise, “reasonable working conditions” should have been explicitly defined to include a mandatory log-off period after several hours of service in a day, reasonable rest breaks after continuous active work, access to safety guidance, emergency helplines, training on occupational hazards, and safe work practices. 

Perhaps most concerning is the lack of specificity in the composition and procedure of different grievance redressal bodies envisaged by the Ordinance. For example, the Ordinance establishes an Internal Dispute Resolution Committee (IDRC) to handle worker complaints, but the rules leave its composition entirely to platforms’ discretion. Past experience from the operation of other laws like the POSH Act shows that the composition of such internal committees determines their effectiveness. Without mandatory worker or union representation on these committees, they become little more than platform-controlled tribunals. 

Moreover, the Ordinance contemplates an Appellate Authority to hear appeals against the decisions of the Welfare Board. Yet, here too, the draft rules provide no guidance on its composition, powers, or establishment timeline. This omission may significantly delay implementation and leave workers without effective recourse mechanisms.

On the whole, the draft rules fail to bring the Ordinance’s promise to life. The state government had taken a laudable step for protecting gig worker rights by promulgating the Ordinance, envisioning social security, occupational health, and transparency in algorithmic decision-making. However, by refusing to make hard choices about rates of welfare fee rates and structures of benefit and leaving essential enforcement mechanisms so bare-boned, the draft rules risk reducing what can be a landmark advance for gig worker protections to little more than a legislative half-measure that promises much but delivers little for the workers it is designed to help.

(Saurabh is an associate professor and co-director at the Centre for Labour Studies, and Madhulika is a research associate at the Centre for Labour Studies, NLSIU)