KOCHI: Employers should ensure that maternity does not affect a female employees’ career prospects, the Kerala High Court said in a judgment.
Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V was considering a petition (WP-C No. 26904/2021) filed by three contract employees of Kerala University of Health Sciences (KUHS) questioning denial of maternity benefits.
In the judgment, the court said, “The employer is to take all steps possible to ensure that they are sympathetic to the cause of the female officer so that she can achieve her potential in the workplace and the time spent by her to deliver and raise her child shall not be detrimental to her career or her prospects. The Maternity Benefit Act, 1961 aims to provide all these facilities to a working woman in a dignified manner so that she may overcome the state of motherhood honourably, peaceably, undeterred by the fear of being victimized for forced absence during the pre or post-natal period.”
The petitioners were working at KUHS on contract basis but their contracts were renewed by the university by leaving an artificial break of two days. They had applied for maternity leave but were denied any allowance by the university. Their plea for maternity leave with benefits was rejected by the university citing the reason that their contract was for less than a year. A government order requiring a woman going on maternity leave to have actually worked for at least 80 days prior to the leave was also relied upon by the university to deny the benefits.
The court said the break inserted between the contract period cannot be used to deny maternity benefits and ordered KUHS to grant the benefits to the petitioners.
