One of two routes, never both. If she is an insured woman eligible under the ESI chapter of the Code on Social Security 2020, ESIC pays her and section 32(7)(b) bars her from claiming from her employer. If she is not, Chapter VI applies and her employer pays the full 26 weeks out of its own pocket. Which route she lands in turns on wages, headcount and contribution history, and for contract staff it can change between one deployment and the next.
The switch: section 32(7)(b)
The Code makes the two routes mutually exclusive in one line. Section 32(7)(b) provides that "any women employee eligible for availing maternity benefit under this Chapter shall not be entitled to claim maternity benefit from her employer under Chapter VI". Chapter IV is the ESI chapter; Chapter VI is the employer-funded maternity chapter. So the first question on any maternity notice is not how much, it is which chapter, because the answer decides whether the money comes from the Corporation or from a payroll.
The two chapters do not switch on at the same headcount, and that gap is where contract staff sit. Under the First Schedule, Chapter IV applies to every establishment with ten or more persons employed other than a seasonal factory. Chapter VI applies to every establishment being a factory, mine or plantation with no headcount qualifier at all, and to every shop or establishment with ten or more employees on any day of the preceding twelve months. A small factory can therefore owe the 26 weeks under Chapter VI while being outside ESI entirely, and a woman above the ESI wage ceiling on a covered site is in the same position for the opposite reason.
Section 61 handles the crossover. A woman entitled under Chapter VI keeps that entitlement, notwithstanding that Chapter IV has become applicable to the establishment, until she actually becomes qualified to claim under section 32. Coverage arriving mid-pregnancy does not strand her, and it does not release the employer early either.
The two routes side by side
The entitlements are close in shape and quite different in who funds them and what it takes to qualify.
| Chapter VI (employer-funded) | Chapter IV (ESI) | |
|---|---|---|
| Who pays | Her employer, directly (s.60(1)) | ESIC, as a cash benefit |
| Qualifying test | 80 days actually worked in an establishment of that employer in the 12 months before the expected date of delivery (s.60(2)) | Contributions payable for not less than 70 days in the immediately preceding two consecutive contribution periods (SS (Central) Rules 2026, r.22(3)(a)) |
| Duration | 26 weeks, not more than 8 before the expected date (s.60(3)) | 26 weeks, not more than 8 before the expected date (r.22(3)(b)) |
| Two or more surviving children | 12 weeks, not more than 6 before (s.60(3), first proviso) | 12 weeks, not more than 6 before (r.22(3)) |
| Adoption or commissioning mother | 12 weeks from the date the child is handed over (s.60(4)) | 12 weeks (ESIC benefits page) |
| Rate | Average daily wage over the 3 calendar months before absence, not below the minimum wage under the Code on Wages 2019 (s.60(1)) | The standard benefit rate for the corresponding contribution period, rounded up (r.22(3)(e)); ESIC describes it as 100% of average daily wages |
| Medical bonus | ₹3,500, or as notified, if the employer does not provide free pre-natal and post-natal care (s.64) | ₹15,000 per case, but only where confinement happens where ESI medical facilities are not available, and for two confinements only (r.22(4)) |
| Miscarriage or MTP | 6 weeks' leave at the maternity-benefit rate (s.65(1)) | 6 weeks (ESIC benefits page) |
| Notice | Form-XI to the employer (SS (Central) Rules 2026, r.35(2)(a)) | Claimed from the Corporation under the regulations |
Two differences do real work. The medical bonus is ₹3,500 on the employer route and ₹15,000 on the ESI route, though the ESI figure is conditional and capped at two confinements. And the qualifying tests are built on different things: Chapter VI counts days worked for one employer, while ESI counts contributions paid in respect of the woman. That second difference is the one that bites a contract workforce.
The 80-day problem when the contractor changes
Section 60(2) is specific about whose establishment the days are counted in. No woman is entitled to maternity benefit "unless she has actually worked in an establishment of the employer from whom she claims maternity benefit, for a period of not less than eighty days in the twelve months immediately preceding the date of her expected delivery". The days attach to the employer she is claiming from, not to the site and not to the work.
The ESI test does not work that way. Rule 22(3)(a) asks whether contributions were payable in respect of her for at least seventy days across the two preceding contribution periods, and contributions follow the insured person through her insurance number regardless of which employer remitted them. On the ESI route a woman who moved between two contractors on the same floor keeps her qualifying days. On the Chapter VI route, on one reading, she may not.
What can be said without taking a side is that the two routes behave differently under churn, and that the commercial exposure sits in different places. On the ESI route the mechanics are already settled elsewhere in the Code: section 31(1) makes the employer pay both contributions "in respect of every employee, whether directly employed by him or by or through a contractor", and section 31(6) lets it recover that from the contractor. On the Chapter VI route there is no equivalent plumbing, which is precisely why the identity question matters.
What the 26 weeks carry with them
Maternity benefit is not only the cash for the absence. Chapter VI attaches a set of obligations that run before, during and after it, and several of them are facility obligations that only the site can actually discharge.
- A hard bar on employment after delivery. Section 59(1) and (2) prohibit an employer from knowingly employing a woman, and prohibit her from working, during the six weeks immediately following delivery, miscarriage or medical termination of pregnancy. This one is absolute and does not depend on which route funds her.
- No arduous work in the run-up. On her request, a pregnant woman cannot be required to do work of an arduous nature, work involving long hours of standing, or work likely to interfere with the pregnancy, during the month preceding the six weeks before her expected delivery and during that six-week period where she has not taken leave (s.59(3), (4)).
- Additional leave. Six weeks for miscarriage or medical termination, two weeks after a tubectomy, and up to one month for illness arising out of pregnancy, delivery, premature birth, miscarriage or medical termination — each at the maternity-benefit rate and each on production of the prescribed proof (s.65).
- Nursing breaks until the child is fifteen months. Two breaks of 15 minutes each, plus up to 15 more minutes for the journey to the crèche depending on the distance (s.66; SS (Central) Rules 2026, r.36).
- A crèche at fifty. Every establishment to which Chapter VI applies with fifty or more employees ordinarily employed must provide a crèche for children under six, within one kilometre, with four visits a day allowed to the woman (s.67; r.37). The one-kilometre radius can be relaxed by the competent authority where a common crèche serves a notified industrial park or area.
- Written and electronic intimation at appointment. Section 67(2) requires every establishment to which the Chapter applies to tell every woman, in writing and electronically, about every benefit available under the Chapter, at the time of her initial appointment. On a contract deployment this is an onboarding step somebody has to own, and it is cheap to miss.
- Dismissal protection, with an appeal. Discharge or dismissal during pregnancy does not deprive her of maternity benefit or medical bonus, and a notice timed to expire during her absence is barred, as is varying her service conditions to her disadvantage. A woman deprived, discharged or dismissed may appeal to the competent authority within sixty days, and that decision is final (s.68). Wages cannot be cut merely because of the lighter work required by s.59 or the nursing breaks under s.66 (s.69).
- Forfeiture if she works elsewhere. A woman who works for remuneration during the period she has been permitted to be absent is not entitled to maternity benefit for that period (s.70). On a contract workforce this is worth knowing before it is discovered.
- An abstract on the wall. Section 71 requires the employer to exhibit an abstract of the Chapter and its rules, in the language or languages of the locality, in a conspicuous place.
The crèche threshold deserves a second look on a mixed site. It counts employees ordinarily employed in the establishment, and the Code's definition of employee is not limited to people on the site's own payroll. A site sitting just under fifty on direct headcount may be over it once the contract crew is counted.
What to settle in the contract, before anyone is pregnant
None of this is decidable in the week a notice arrives. The decisions are contractual and they are cheap to make early.
- Which route each deployed woman is on, reviewed when wages change. The ESI wage ceiling is the trigger, and a worker crossing it mid-year moves from a funded benefit to an employer-funded one.
- Who carries the Chapter VI cost if the route is the employer one, said in the work order rather than left to section 2(27). The Code gives no default allocation between site and contractor, so the contract is the only place it exists.
- Whether the contractor's 80-day clock is being tracked at all, and what happens to it when the contractor changes but the worker does not.
- Who issues the section 67(2) intimation at onboarding, and in what form, since it has to be both written and electronic.
- Whether the crèche obligation has been tested against total headcount including contract staff, not just direct payroll.
- Who holds the Form-XI notices and the medical certificates, and how they reach whoever is actually paying.
Velura's own position on this is unremarkable: we track the route per deployed worker, keep the consent, notice and certificate trail with the deployment file, and raise the allocation question at the work-order stage rather than after. Whether a given arrangement discharges a given site's liability is a question for that site's counsel, not for us and not for this article.
Sources
- The Code on Social Security, 2020 (Act 36 of 2020), Gazette text hosted by the Ministry of Labour and Employment — s.2(27) (employer, including contractor), s.31 (payment of contributions for employees engaged through a contractor, and recovery), s.32(7)(b) (the bar on claiming under Chapter VI), ss.59 to 71 (Chapter VI: prohibition after delivery, right to maternity benefit, 80-day test, 26 weeks, notice, medical bonus, additional leave, nursing breaks, crèche, intimation, dismissal protection and the sixty-day appeal, no deduction of wages, forfeiture, and the abstract to be exhibited), and the First Schedule (applicability of Chapters IV and VI). Opened and read.
- The Social Security (Central) Rules, 2026, G.S.R. 344(E) dated 8 May 2026 — r.22(3)(a) (70 days of contributions across two consecutive contribution periods), r.22(3)(b) and (e) (26 weeks; daily rate at the standard benefit rate), r.22(4) (₹15,000 confinement medical bonus, conditional, two confinements), r.35 (Form-XI notice and payment), r.36 (nursing breaks of 15 minutes plus up to 15 minutes' travel), r.37 (crèche for fifty or more employees, within one kilometre, children under six). Opened and read from a mirrored copy of the Gazette [VERIFY: against the e-Gazette original].
- Employees' State Insurance Corporation, Benefits page — "ESIC provides 100% of average daily wages in cash up to 26 weeks in confinement and 6 week in case of miscarriage, during maternity leave and 12 weeks for commissioning mother and adopting mother." Opened and read.
- Ministry of Labour and Employment — the ₹21,000 monthly Code-wage ceiling for ESI coverage, and the commencement of the Codes on 21 November 2025 [VERIFY: carried over from the ESIC registration article on this site; the underlying FAQ and commencement notification were not re-opened for this piece]
- The Social Security (Central) Rules, 2026 retain a medical bonus of ₹3,500 under section 64 in the Chapter VI forms [VERIFY: the figure appears in the prescribed form text rather than in a rule fixing it; whether the Central Government has notified a higher amount under s.64 was not established]