Employees' Social Insurance Ordinance, 1962

The Employees' Social Insurance Ordinance, 1962 set up a social insurance scheme -- the Employees' Social Insurance Institution -- to provide certain workers and their dependants with financial support in the event of sickness, maternity, workplace injury, or death (Section 3). It applies only to the areas, industries, and classes of workers the Federal Government specifically notifies (Section 1).

Section 2 defines who counts as an "employee" for the scheme, and importantly excludes several groups: government servants, armed forces members, railway staff, workers under local councils, domestic servants, and (notably) factory workers earning more than a stated monthly wage threshold. Employers pay "contributions" into the scheme on behalf of covered employees (Section 21), and unpaid contributions can be recovered as arrears of land revenue (Section 24).

Chapter V lists the actual benefits: sickness benefit (Section 36), maternity benefit (Section 37), a death grant if someone dies following sickness (Section 38), free medical care during sickness and maternity (Section 39), injury benefit for work-related injuries (Section 40), and disablement pension or gratuity depending on the severity of disability (Sections 41-42), plus a survivors' pension and death grant if death results from a workplace injury (Sections 43-44). Section 50 states that these benefits cannot be assigned or attached (seized to pay other debts).

Disputes over benefits are handled through a dedicated system: an internal decision-making authority (Section 56), Medical Boards to assess disability (Section 57), and specially constituted "insurance courts" to hear appeals, with a further appeal route beyond that (Sections 59-66). Chapter VII creates offences and penalties for violations, though the extract does not specify the amounts, and Section 73 protects an employee from being dismissed or punished by their employer during a period of sickness covered by the scheme.

This is an old law from 1962 and its rate table (in the extract) sets benefit amounts in fractions of a rupee tied to daily wage brackets that are now clearly obsolete -- these should not be relied on for current benefit levels, which will have been revised by subsequent notifications or superseding legislation (such as later social security institutions). The wage exclusion threshold and benefit table in this extract are historical figures only.