The Telangana government from Monday banned payment of wages in cash by private industries, business houses and commercial establishments, besides offering minimum wage protection to gig and platform workers across the state, as part of its new labor governance framework.
An official statement issued by the state government on Monday said that the changes were introduced through a notification in the form of a government order issued on May 30, and came into effect from Monday (June 1).
According to the statement, the government has introduced a unified wage structure across sectors and revised the minimum wage by skill level and location, extending protection to categories of workers who were previously outside the minimum wage network.
She said that the new payment system aims to eliminate cash-based exploitation, protect purchasing power, and raise the dignity of work, by securing a 100% digital fingerprint.
“Payment by paper cash is expressly prohibited. Employers must disburse wages through direct electronic transfer (NEFT/RTGS/IMPS) or bank cheques, which builds an immutable trail for labor inspectors and protects vulnerable labor groups,” the statement said.
In order to reduce corporate red tape and ensure straightforward compliance, the Notice eliminates hundreds of industry-specific timelines. Instead, it classifies all non-agricultural, commercial and industrial enterprises into four clean skill categories that are assessed across three simplified geographic regions.
For the purpose of setting minimum wages, the state is divided into three wage zones to determine minimum wage scales – Zone 1: Municipal Corporations, Zone 2: Municipalities and Zone 3: Rural Areas.
“The zoning system allows companies to plan labor-intensive operations, including textile and manufacturing projects, in low-cost rural areas while maintaining company operations in urban centers,” he added.
Likewise, workers were also classified into four categories: unskilled, semi-skilled, skilled, and highly skilled.
Under the revised structure, the minimum monthly wage has been significantly increased from $12,750 to $16,000 for unskilled workers $13,152 to $17,000 for semi-skilled workers, $13,772 to $18,500 for skilled workers and $14,607 to $20,000 for highly skilled workers.
Among them is the formal expansion of minimum wage protection to freelance and platform workers working in e-commerce, courier services and liquefied petroleum gas distribution. The notification also recognizes specialist roles such as pesticide sprayers using drone technology within the high skills category, ensuring higher minimum wages for such occupations.
The order provides equal minimum wage rates for male, female, transgender and physically disabled employees who perform the same or equivalent work.
The law also seeks to close subcontracting loopholes by making primary employers directly responsible for paying wages if third-party agencies fail to pay workers, ensuring prompt settlement of wages under the law.
In its mandate to ensure favorable working conditions for workers, the order said that any task performed after standard eight-hour daily shifts, or required on public holidays and weekly rest days, shall be compensated as overtime at double (twice) the standard rate of wages.
If an industry group is already paying rates above the baseline for this, the old wages are legally exempt from the new rules. Moreover, these workers are given an additional mandatory increase of 10% on their old wages, the statement added.
