The Social Security (Central) Rules, 2026 can be accessed here.
Every aggregator engaging a new gig or platform worker must now register them on a central government portal in real time and report their exit. The Ministry of Labour and Employment on May 8, 2026 notified the Social Security (Central) Rules, 2026, the final implementing rules under the Code on Social Security, 2020, placing direct compliance obligations on platforms like Swiggy, Zomato, and Ola, while also mandating a National Social Security Board for gig and platform workers.
The rules complete implementing rule-making for all four labour codes nearly six years after Parliament passed the underlying legislation. They came into force on May 8, 2026, the date of their publication in the gazette.
What aggregators must do: Under Rule 48 and Rule 49, aggregators face the following obligations:
Aggregators must calculate contributions either as a notified percentage of their annual turnover or as 5% of the amounts paid or payable to gig and platform workers, depending on the basis they opt for. The annual turnover figure explicitly excludes taxes, cess, and surcharges payable to the central government, which meaningfully reduces the contribution base for large platforms.
Aggregators who overpay contributions can claim a refund electronically. The designated authority must process and return the excess within 90 days of receiving the claim.
The definition of “aggregator” covers not just the platform itself but associate companies, holding companies, subsidiaries, limited liability partnerships, and third parties. Platforms cannot route obligations through intermediaries to escape compliance.
The 90-day problem: A gig or platform worker qualifies for social security benefits only if they worked at least 90 days with a single aggregator, or 120 days across multiple aggregators, in the previous financial year. The threshold risks excluding the majority of the workforce the rules claim to protect.
Platform disclosures suggest the average delivery partner works fewer than 40 days annually. A 2022 NITI Aayog report estimated India’s gig workforce at 7.7 million in 2020–21 and projected it to reach 23.5 million by 2029–30. The majority of those workers are seasonal, part-time, or multi-platform workers and will not clear either threshold.
The rules count a worker as “engaged” on any calendar day they earn any income from an aggregator, regardless of amount. Working across three aggregators on the same day counts as three days, not one. MediaNama has previously reported that limited awareness and unclear deadlines had already left many workers at risk of exclusion even before these thresholds apply.
Workers lose eligibility if they fail to meet the 90- or 120-day threshold in any given financial year, or once they turn 60. No accumulated benefit survives a year of insufficient engagement or exit from the gig economy.
Aadhaar-linked database, no data protection: A real-time national database of gig worker identity, income, and employment status is now being built, even as questions remain around how the Digital Personal Data Protection framework will apply in practice to this ecosystem.
The rules require Aadhaar-linked self-declaration registration for every unorganised worker above the age of 16. Aggregators must upload appointment and exit details to a central portal in real time and share worker details quarterly. Workers who fail to keep personal details updated, including address, occupation, mobile number, and skills, lose eligibility for social security schemes.
The Digital Personal Data Protection Rules, notified in 2025, are not yet operational. The Social Security Rules cite no data protection framework and set no compliance conditions tied to DPDP compliance. The gap matters because the portal will hold Aadhaar numbers, income data, and employment histories of potentially tens of millions of workers, updated in real time by their employers, with no clarity on who accesses this data, under what conditions, or what remedies workers have if it is misused.
MediaNama has previously reported that platforms already hold Aadhaar details, driving licences, and bank details of workers at the point of onboarding, yet have shown little appetite for voluntarily sharing that data with the government.
Benefits still undefined: What gig workers actually receive remains entirely unspecified. The Code on Social Security mandates the framing of schemes covering life and disability cover, accident insurance, health and maternity benefits, and old age protection. The rules create the registration and contribution machinery to fund those schemes. But no scheme has been notified under Section 114 of the Code.
The only benefit announced so far is Ayushman Bharat health cover under Budget 2025-26, and even that has yet to be launched for platform workers.
Workers have demanded answers since the December 2025 nationwide strikes, during which 40,000 delivery workers walked off the job demanding social security, assured wages, and protection from arbitrary deactivation. The rules do not answer any of those demands.
The National Social Security Board: The rules constitute the National Social Security Board under Section 114(6) of the Code as the statutory body for gig and platform workers. The Board includes:
The quorum for gig worker matters is six members. The Board can also constitute expert committees to advise on welfare matters, estimate the number of gig workers, and identify new categories of aggregators.
State laws, central gap: Karnataka’s Platform-Based Gig Workers Act covers roughly 400,000 workers and mandates contract standards, algorithmic transparency, written reasons for deactivation, and a dedicated payment verification system to track contributions. None of those requirements appear in the central rules. The central framework is thinner on implementation than the state law it is supposed to anchor.
e-Shram registration progress has also been uneven, with Maharashtra leading at 134,705 platform worker registrations and states like Lakshadweep recording just four. If voluntary registration has failed to achieve scale, mandatory registration via aggregator APIs is a meaningful step forward, but only if the portal infrastructure and enforcement machinery are actually in place when the 45-day deadline hits.
Twelve older rules superseded: The Social Security (Central) Rules, 2026 supersede twelve older rules including the Employees’ State Insurance (Central) Rules, 1950, the Payment of Gratuity (Central) Rules, 1972, and the Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Rules, 2009.
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