INDIA · STATE · WORKING TIME
Working hours under the Tamil Nadu Shops and Establishments Act
What the Shops and Establishments Act applicable in Tamil Nadu sets for daily and weekly hours, spread-over, rest intervals, overtime and night-shift work — the rules that govern employers in Chennai, Coimbatore. Every value below links to the source it was verified against.
- Governing Act
- Tamil Nadu Shops and Establishments Act, 1947 (Tamil Nadu Act XXXVI of 1947), read with the Tamil Nadu Shops and Establishments Rules, 1948 and G.O. (Rt.) No. 231 / Notification II(2)/LWSD/652(a)/2026 of 24 August 2026stationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- Maximum daily hours
- 8 hours in any day (condition 4 of the 24 August 2026 notification under s.6, restating the Act's limit for every establishment using the 365-day exemption)stationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- Maximum weekly hours
- 48 hours in any week (condition 4 of the 24 August 2026 notification, restating the Act's limit)stationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- Spread-over limit
- 12 hours in a day including breakskeka.com ↗Secondary source
- Rest interval
- At least 1 hour after every 4 hours of workkeka.com ↗Secondary source
- Overtime rate
- 2× the ordinary rate of wageskeka.com ↗Secondary source
- Overtime cap
- Total work including overtime may not exceed 10.5 hours in any day and 57 hours in any week (condition 4 of the 24 August 2026 notification). Overtime requires a proper indent (condition 5)stationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- Weekly off
- One day per week on rotation, recorded in Form S and displayed in the establishment (condition 1). Notification II(2)/LWSD/652(a)/2026 exempts all establishments from s.11(1) for three years from 24 August 2026, so they may open all 365 daysstationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- Women on night shifts
- Women may not be required to work after 8 p.m. in normal circumstances; with written consent the employer may allow work 8 p.m.–6 a.m. subject to adequate protection of dignity, honour and safety (condition 6), transport for shift work with a notice at the main entrance (condition 7), and an operative POSH Internal Complaints Committee (condition 9) — conditions of the 24 August 2026 notificationstationeryprinting.tn.gov.in ↗
- IT/ITES exemption
- Not verified — check your state rules
Notes on Tamil Nadu
- →The consolidated Act text could not be read (India Code timed out; the PRS copy is an image-only scan), so the 8/48-hour figures are cited from the 2026 gazette notification which restates them as conditions. Section numbers for the base provisions (reported as ss.9, 10, 14) are not verified.
- →The widely reported Tamil Nadu “12-hour day / flexible hours” change was the Factories (Amendment) Act, 2023, not this Act, and the state announced its withdrawal in May 2023. The Shops and Establishments (Amendment) Act, 2023 (L.A. Bill 9 of 2023) only inserted welfare sections 22-B to 22-E (drinking water, latrines, rest room, first aid) and commences on a date to be notified.
- →No IT/ITES-specific exemption G.O. was located; the 24 August 2026 notification covers all establishments and continues the 23 March 2023 notification II(2)/LWSD/174(a)/2023.
- →A 2025 amendment (reported as Act 39 of 2025) replaced the penalty chapter; it was not read. Notification of state rules under the OSH Code 2020 was not checked.
Verify before you rely on it. State rules are amended by notification, exemptions for IT/ITES establishments are often time-bound and renewed separately, and the Labour Codes continue to be brought into force state by state. This page records what we could verify against a named source at the time of writing — it is general information, not legal advice, and it does not replace reading your state's current rules or asking your compliance advisor.
Keeping to these limits in practice
Limits are only enforceable against a record. Workclave captures every work session with its start, stop and breaks, applies your workspace's shift and break rules, and produces the statutory attendance register from the same data — so daily, weekly and overtime totals are computed as work happens rather than reconstructed at month end. Multi-state employers can configure rules per workspace.
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