Right to Disconnect Bill Aims to Shield After-Hours Work in Parliament
Right to Disconnect Bill Aims to Shield After-Hours Work in Parliament
Private member's bill seeks employees' right to ignore work calls and emails after hours, plus new welfare authority and gig worker protections.
Supriya Sule, a Lok Sabha MP from the Nationalist Congress Party, tabled the Right to Disconnect Bill, 2025 in the Lok Sabha as a private member’s bill. The proposal would give employees a legal right to ignore work-related calls and emails outside office hours.
The bill, named Right to Disconnect Bill, 2025, aims to establish an employees' welfare authority to protect the right to disconnect beyond work hours and on holidays. Sule has argued it would foster a better quality of life and reduce burnout from today’s digital culture. Alongside this bill, she introduced two other private member's bills: the Paternity and Paternal Benefits Bill, 2025 to ensure paid paternal leave, and the Code on Social Security (Amendment) Bill, 2025 to recognize platform-based gig workers as a distinct category with minimum wages, regulated hours, social security and fair contracts.
These moves arrive as Parliament's winter session began on December 1, reflecting a broader push to protect workers in a changing digital economy.
Cover image source: ‘No work calls after office hours’: Private member’s bill in Lok Sabha seeks employees’ right to disconnect 🔗
