MATERNITY RIGHTS IN THE GIG ECONOMY: A SOCIO-LEGAL STUDY OF PLATFORM WORKERS UNDER THE CODE ON SOCIAL SECURITY, 2020

AUTHOR – SNIJA D, STUDENT AT TAMIL NADU DR. AMBEDKAR LAW UNIVERSITY

BEST CITATION – SNIJA D, MATERNITY RIGHTS IN THE GIG ECONOMY: A SOCIO-LEGAL STUDY OF PLATFORM WORKERS UNDER THE CODE ON SOCIAL SECURITY, 2020, INDIAN JOURNAL OF LEGAL REVIEW (IJLR), 6 (5) OF 2026, PG. 943-953, APIS – 3920 – 0001 & ISSN – 2583-2344.

ABSTRACT

The rapid proliferation of the gig economy in India has fundamentally restructured the contours of labour relations, giving rise to a novel category of workers who defy classification within traditional employer–employee binaries. Women engaged as platform workers — spanning delivery executives, cab aggregator drivers, domestic service providers, and freelance digital professionals — occupy a particularly precarious position at the intersection of informal labour and digital capitalism. This paper undertakes a socio-legal examination of the maternity rights available to such workers under the Code on Social Security, 2020, which for the first time in Indian legislative history formally acknowledges the existence of gig and platform workers as a distinct category. Notwithstanding this recognition, the Code stops short of extending the full panoply of maternity protections, raising pressing questions of constitutional equity, reproductive justice, and social security architecture. Through a doctrinal analysis of the Code alongside the Maternity Benefit Act, 1961, the Constitution of India, and international instruments such as ILO Convention No. 183, this paper identifies critical lacunae in the current legal regime, interrogates their socio-economic underpinnings, and proposes a rights-based framework for comprehensive maternity protection for platform workers in India.

Keywords: Gig Economy, Platform Workers, Maternity Rights, Code on Social Security 2020, Maternity Benefit Act, Informal Labour, Reproductive Justice, Social Security.