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Section 112: Helpline and facilitation centers for unorganised workers

The Code on Social Security, 2020 (Act No. 36 of 2020) • Official Statutory Text & Plain English Practice Guide

Statutory Mandate
Chapter IX: Social Security for Unorganised, Gig & Platform Workers
Competent Labour Forum
Act No. 36 of 2020
Section 111 All 163 Sections of Code on Social Security, 2020 Section 113

Legal Commentary & Landmark Judgments: Section 112

Section 112 of the Code on Social Security, 2020 mandates the establishment of dedicated helplines and facilitation centres by the appropriate Government to assist unorganised workers in accessing social security benefits, completing digital registrations, and redressing administrative grievances.

  • Statutory Mandate for Toll-Free Helplines: Mandates that the appropriate Government shall set up such toll-free call centres or helplines as may be prescribed, operating in regional languages to provide unorganised workers with real-time information regarding available welfare schemes.
  • Establishment of Multi-Service Facilitation Centres: Requires the appropriate Government to establish facilitation centres across industrial clusters, rural tehsils, and urban labour markets to assist illiterate or digitally marginalized workers in completing electronic registrations on the e-Shram portal.
  • Facilitation of Welfare Claims and Direct Benefit Transfer: Empowers facilitation centres to help workers and their families submit online claims for death relief, disability compensation, maternity benefits, and educational scholarships, guiding them through document scanning and biometric verification.
  • Institutional Grievance Redressal Gateway: Designates facilitation centres as ground-level grievance collection points for registering complaints regarding rejected registrations, blocked DBT transfers, or contractor exploitation, routing them to the competent Inspector-cum-Facilitator.
Key Landmark Precedents:
  • Swaraj Abhiyan v. Union of India (2016) 7 SCC 498: The Supreme Court held that the State has an affirmative constitutional duty to create accessible administrative facilitation mechanisms and grievance helplines to ensure that welfare entitlements reach the most impoverished citizens in rural and unorganised sectors.
  • In Re: Problems and Miseries of Migrant Labourers (2021) 7 SCC 774: The Supreme Court emphasized that physical and digital facilitation centres at district and taluka levels are indispensable to bridge the digital divide for illiterate migrant workers seeking social security benefits.
  • Peoples Union for Democratic Rights v. Union of India (1982) 3 SCC 235: Affirmed that statutory labour protections become meaningless if illiterate workmen are left without access to institutional legal aid and administrative facilitation to assert their rights.
Courtroom Practice & Strategic Litigation Guidance:

Municipal corporations, district labour officers, and trade unions should coordinate with Common Service Centres (CSCs) to convert them into authorized Section 112 facilitation nodes. Ensure that staff are trained to navigate the e-Shram portal, troubleshoot biometric mismatches, and maintain physical complaint registers to track grievance disposal within a mandatory 15-day service-level agreement (SLA).

Section 111 All 163 Sections of Code on Social Security, 2020 Section 113