ON NOVEMBER 21, 2025, newspapers flashed full page advertisements sponsored by the central government, declaring proudly about labour reforms for ‘Atmbanirbhar Bharat’, and for ushering a new era for gig and online platform workers. Ironically, with that same stroke, working journalists and other workmen in newspaper establishments had lost all benefits gained since 1955, when two protective laws were first legislated to protect their service conditions and rates of wages.
In the past, two National Labour Commission have worked on reforming labour laws and recommending means to reduce labour disputes. While the first and second labour commissions, led by Justice P.B. Gajendragadkar (in 1969) and Justice Ravindra Varma (in 1982), provided several recommendations, those remained unenforced on paper. In the meantime, with no major reforms contemplated, the Indian government continued to bring in piecemeal amendments to the plethora of labour laws in the country, which remained the most comprehensive in the world.
The Ravindra Varma Commission had been the first to recommend the consolidation of the independent labour enactments and for their codification with simplification. Over the years, the advent of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation of the economy impacted the labour economy, with the restructuring of investment policy and new industrial production making many of the labour laws irrelevant. Technocrats now ran the show with outsourced labour, with judicial support justifying the outsourcing of labour with little or no protection at all.
In the past, two National Labour Commission have worked on reforming labour laws and recommending means to reduce labour disputes.
Labour regulations in newspaper establishments
Newspaper establishments have been composed of two categories of workers, mainly - journalists, and non-working journalists such as clerical staff and other staff involved in printing and circulation of newspapers. When India’s first labour legislation, the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, was brought in, its application to the newspaper industry was difficult. On one hand, the minority of the workers, the working journalists, did not strictly come within the definition of “workmen” under the ID Act. On the other hand, the other employees and workmen engaged in other work of the establishments were certainly covered by labour legislations enacted by the Central and State governments..
Strong labour unions in the press attached to the newspaper establishments were able to make use of the labour machinery for various disputes while the working journalists were left to fend for themselves. Admittedly their pay structure was very poor and mostly depended upon the circulation of the newspapers. At this stage, the Press Commission, constituted by the Central government, inquired into the conditions of employment of working journalists and made recommendations for improvement and regulation of such service conditions by means of legislation.
These recommendations covered minimum period of notice, gratuity, provident fund, settlement of industrial disputes, leave with pay, hours of work and minimum wages. The Commission also suggested the application of the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946, and the Employees Provident Funds Act, 1952, to the industry.
Based on the Press Commission’s recommendations, the Parliament enacted The Working Journalists and Other Newspaper Employees (Conditions of Service) and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1955 (‘WJ Act’). The object of the Act was to regulate certain conditions of service of working journalists and other persons employed in newspaper establishments. The Act defined the terms “newspaper”, “newspaper employee”, “working journalist” and “non-journalist newspaper employee” by virtue of Section 3. By virtue of this legislation, working journalists were now also covered by the provisions of the ID Act. Further, it provided for a higher rate of retrenchment compensation, and gratuity for service not less than three years.
The Act also provided for hours of work for working journalists including their leave entitlement. The Central government assumed powers to fix rates of wages and also constituted a wage board for fixing wages for journalists and non-working journalists. In addition to these rights, the newspaper establishments were directed to frame standing orders in respect of conditions of service of their employees in terms of Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act and also where the establishment has more than twenty workers it was covered by the Provident Funds Act.
The Express Newspapers (Private) Ltd and other newspapers challenged the constitutionality of the WJ Act.
Why the Supreme Court upheld the Working Journalists Act
Due to the pressure exerted by the Federation of the Working Journalists, India’s largest journalist organisation, the Central government constituted a wage board for fixing the wages of the employees of the newspaper establishments. The Express Newspapers (Private) Ltd and other newspapers challenged the constitutionality of the WJ Act. They also challenged the power of the government to constitute a wage board in terms of Section 5(1)(a)(iii) of the ID Act.
In 1958, the Supreme Court did not hesitate to uphold the provisions of the WJ Act and held:
“If measures have got to be devised for the amelioration of the conditions of working journalists who are employed in the newspaper establishments, the only way in which it could be done was by directing this piece of legislation against the Press Industry employers in general. Even considering the Act as a measure of social welfare legislation the State could only make a beginning somewhere without embarking on similar legislations in relation to all other industries and if that was done in this case no charge could be leveled against the State that it was discriminating against one industry as compared with the others.”
The Supreme Court did find Section 5(1)(a)(iii) of the ID Act to be “violative of the fundamental right guaranteed under Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution and [as] therefore unconstitutional and should be struck down.”.
Thus, while working journalists and other employees gained a new piece of labour legislation to protect their service conditions, they could not succeed in getting the wage board constituted under the IDAct.
This once again led the Parliament to enact another legislation - The Working Journalists (Fixation of Rate of Wages) Act, 1958. The object of the Act was to provide for the fixation of rates of wages in respect of working journalists. Subsequent to this enactment, several wage boards were constituted, both for the working journalists and non-journalists in newspaper establishments and as many as eight awards were rendered by different wage boards in the last seven decades. Even the challenge made to the last wage board award (the Majithia Wage Board Award) was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2014 and the wages of the employees of the newspapers were ensured.
A new process to consolidate India’s labour laws
However, when the government attempted to consolidate and codify new labour enactments, it brought and subsumed 29 labour legislations categorised into four different codes. While the Code on Wages was passed in Parliament in 2019, the other three codes were passed in 2020 amidst stiff opposition from all major trade unions including the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh. The notification of bringing into force all these four new codes was considerably delayed.
Initially the delays occurred, likely due to stiff opposition from the labour unions, and the ensuing election to the Parliament in 2024 and the election to the Bihar Assembly. Several state governments were also not happy and delayed framing of the rules necessary for the proper functioning of the codes.
The Central government, which originally notified the draft rules as early as 2020 once again issued fresh draft rules and published them in the gazette on December 30, 2025, to be brought into effect from April 1, 2026.
Of the four codes, the one code which subsumes the WJ Act and The Working Journalists (Fixation of Rate of Wages) Act, 1958 is the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 (‘OSHW Code’). This code is supposed to have codified and subsumed thirteen labour enactments including the Factories Act, 1948, the Plantation Labour Act, 1951, the Mines Act, 1952, Motor Transport Workers Act, 1961, the Beedi Cigar Workers Act, 1966, and the Contract Labour (Abolition and Regulation) Act, 1970.It was never made clear as to why the different enactments made for specific target groups of workers in different industries was now being sought to be clubbed along with WJ Act.
How the OSHW Code strips working journalists of crucial rights
The OSHW Code was notified to come into force on November 21, 2025 while its draft rules were published in the gazette only on December 30, 2025 to be brought into effect from April 1, 2026. The consolidation of the thirteen enactments are now brought within 145 sections with fourteen chapters.
Sections 2(zp), 2(zq) and 2(zzm) of the OSHW Code define the terms “newspaper”, “newspaper establishment” and “Working Journalists” and these definitions are identical to similar terms respectively found in Sections 2(b), 2(d) and 2(f) of the WJ Act. The OSHW Code has general provisions including the enforcement officials in the first ten chapters, which also dealt with the separate enactments in Chapter XI that contained eight parts dealing with contract labour, inter-state migrant workers, audio visual workers, mines, beedi and cigar workers, construction workers, factories and plantations.
Therefore, as on date, while working journalists are covered by the OSHW Code, they do not have any benefit or advantage.
Shockingly there are no special provisions with regard to working journalists and non-journalists and their right to have their service conditions and rates of wages fixed by their special enactments. Under Section 143 of the OSHW Code, a list of previous labour enactments including the WJ Act and the Working Journalists (Fixation of Rate of Wages) Act are to be considered to have been repealed on the dates on which notifications were issued by the Central government under Section 1(2) of the OSHW Act, 2020. The Central government has now declared November 21, 2025 as the date on which the provisions of the OSHW Code came into force.
Therefore, as of date, there is no special legislation for the working journalists and non-journalists, contrary to how it was since 1955. Though the new OSHW Code is supposed to have subsumed those two legislations, no special provisions regarding their employment, which were earlier found in the previous two legislations, are incorporated in the present code. Therefore, as on date, while working journalists are covered by the OSHW Code, they do not have any benefit or advantage.
For instance, if one sees Section 25 of the OSHW Code which deals with working hours, it generally talks about the normal working hours which is eight hours. Section 26 talks about weekly and compensatory holidays.
While the maximum hours prescribed may correspond with Section 6 of the WJ Act, in Section 6(2), which allows working journalists rest for a period of not less than twenty-four consecutive hours during any period of seven consecutive days, mentions to the specific period between 10 P.M. and 6.A.M. are totally absent.
Similarly, there is no fixation of revision of rates of wages mechanism and application of the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946, and the Employees Provident Funds Act, 1952 to the working journalists as guaranteed under the previous laws. While the working journalists earlier enjoyed gratuity for limited years of service (something that was upheld by the Supreme Court in, 2010) and also higher retrenchment compensation, the present OSHW code removes all such benefits accrued to them.
Section 5(2) of the WJ Act was a crucial provision wherein if a working journalist resigns from his post on grounds of conscience, they can still fight their case in labour court and contend that such a resignation could not be accepted by the newspaper establishment. Such a right was made to protect the special nature of the work of the journalist and it was available to all journalists including editors except if he does not have any managerial or administrative work. Such a valuable right was not found in any labour legislation and fully protected the journalists with conscience. The OSHW Code retains no such provision.
The effect of the new OSHW Code is that newspaper establishments will again be covered by laws which were applicable before the enactment of WJ Act and the Rates of Fixation of Wages Act, 1958. In essence, while non-working journalists may have the position of a workman under the previous laws of pre-1955 WJ Act, working journalists have been left with little recourse. , theThis has now completely reversed the hard earned gains of the newspaper employees over the last 70 years and taken them back to square one.