Annual, casual and sick leave and other holidays

(1) Every worker shall be allowed a weekly holiday with wages: Provided that the State Government may, by notification, fix different days as weekly holiday for different class of shops and establishments of a area. (2) Every worker shall be entitled to eight days' casual leave with wages in every calendar year which shall be credited into the account of the worker on a quarterly basis. (3) Every worker who has worked for a period of two hundred and forty days or more in a shop or establishment during a calendar year, shall be allowed during the subsequent calendar year, leave with wages for a number of days calculated at the rate of one day for every twenty days of work performed by him during the previous calendar year. (4) Every worker shall be permitted to accumulate the earned leave upto a maximum of forty-five days. (5) Where the employer refuses to sanction the leave due when applied fifteen days in advance, then the worker shall have a right to encash the leave in excess of forty-five days: Provided that if a worker is entitled to leave under this section, is discharged by his employer before he has been allowed the leave, or if, having applied for and having been refused the leave, he quits his employment on account of retirement, resignation, death or permanent disability, the employer shall pay him full wages for the period of leave due to him. (6) A worker shall be entitled to eight paid festival holidays in a calendar year, namely, the Independence Day, Republic Day and Gandhi Jayanti and five such other festival holidays as may be agreed between the employer and the workers, before the commencement of the year. (7) For the purposes of sub-section (3),- (a) any day of lay-off, by agreement or contract or as permissible under the standing order certified under the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946 (No. 20 of 1946); (b) in the case of a female worker, the maternity leave under the provisions of the Maternity Benefit Act, 1961 (No. 53 of 1961); (c) the leave earned in the year prior to that in which the leave is availed; or (d) the absence of the worker due to temporary disablement caused by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment,- shall be deemed to be days on which the worker has worked in a shop or establishment for the purpose of computation of the period of two hundred and forty days or more, but shall not earn leave for these days. (8) The leave admissible under sub-section (3) shall be exclusive of all holidays, whether occurring during or at either end of the period of leave.