The Punjab Shops & Commercial Establishment Act, and Rules, 1958 are applicable to all the shops and commercial establishments in the areas notified by Government of Punjab.
The Act is enacted for the purpose of protecting the rights of employees.
The Act provides regulations of the payment of wages, terms of services, work hours, rest intervals, overtime work, opening and closing hours, closed days, holidays, leaves, maternity leave and benefits, work conditions, rules for employment of children, records maintenance, etc.
Commercial establishment means any premises wherein any business, trade or profession is carried on for profit and includes journalistic or printing establishment and premises in which business of banking, insurance, stocks and shares, brokerage and produce exchange is carried on or which is used as hotel, restaurant, boarding or eating house, theatre, cinema or other place of public entertainment or any other place which the Government may declare, by notification in the official Gazette, to be a commercial establishment for the purposes of this Act;
Establishment means a shop or a commercial establishment;
Shop means any premises where any trade or business is carried on or where services are rendered to customers and includes offices, store-rooms, godowns, sale-depots or ware-houses, whether in the same premises or otherwise, used in connection with such trade or business but does not include a commercial establishment or a shop attached to a factory where the persons employed in the shop are allowed the benefits provided for workers under the Factories Act, 1948.
Establishments existing in areas to which this Act applies or where this Act is extended, have to register within thirty days from the date on which this Act comes into force or the date on which the Act is extended, as the case may be.
New establishment in such area, shall register within thirty days the date of which the establiment commences its work.
Within the period specified mentioned above, the employer of every establishment shall send to the prescribed authority concerned a statement in the prescribed form containing, (a) the name of the employer and the manager, if any; (b) postal address of the establishment; (c) the name, if any; of the establishment; (d) number of persons employed; (e) such other particulars as may be prescribed.
On receipt of the statement, the authority shall on being satisfied about the correctness of the statement, register the establishment in the register of establishments in such a manner as may be prescribed and shall issue in a prescribed form a registration certificate to the employer. The registration certificate shall on demand by the inspector, be shown to him by the employer.
It shall be the duty of the employer to notify to the prescribed authority in the prescribed form any change in respect of any information contained in his statement under this section within seven days after the change has taken place. The authority shall on receiving such notice and on being satisfied about its correctness make the change in the register of establishments in accordance with such notice and shall amend the registration certificate, if necessary.
The employer shall, within ten days of his closing the establishment, notify to the prescribed authority in writing accordingly. The authority shall, on receiving the information and being satisfied about the correctness remove the name of such establishment from the register of establishments and cancel the registration certificate.
Act is not applicable to the establishments and persons mentioned here below: