The Employee State Insurance Act, 1948, is a social welfare legislation. It has been enacted with the purpose of providing certain benefits to employees in case of sickness, maternity and employment injury and also to make provision for certain others matters incidental thereto, thereby trying to attain the goal of socio-economic justice enshrined in the Directive principles of state policy under part 4 of the Indian constitution. During the early stages, the ESI scheme was implemented at just two industrial centers in the country namely, Kanpur and Delhi with a total coverage of about 1.20 Lakh workers. Gradually, it was implemented in a phased manner across different states of the country. The Employee State Insurance Act, 1948 applies to non-seasonal, power using factories or manufacturing units employing ten or more persons and non-power using establishments employing twenty or more persons. The Central government shall prescribe the monthly wage limit for coverage under the ESI Act in the ESI (central) rules, 1950. The present wage ceiling for coverage (excluding remuneration for over-time work) is Rs.6500 per month (Rule 50 of ESI central rules, 1950). The Employee State Insurance Corporation, an apex corporate body, administers the comprehensive and well-designed social security programme under the ESI Act. The ESI scheme under the ESI Act is a self-financing health insurance scheme.
