The Mines Act, 1952

What it does

The Act regulated work in mines. Its subject was the mine as a workplace: the qualifications of those who manage and supervise it, the safety of the working, ventilation and the control of dangerous conditions, the health and welfare of the workers, hours of work and the notices and returns to the authorities. The Director General of Mines Safety and the inspectors under him enforced it, and regulations made under the Act, notably the Coal Mines Regulations, 1957 and the Metalliferous Mines Regulations, 1961, supplied the technical detail.

The Act is a repealed instrument. The Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020 repeals it on commencement, and the labour codes were brought into force on 21 November 2025. The page is therefore about a statute that governs earlier periods, and pending matters, as the Code's savings provisions allow.

Who it binds

The owner, agent and manager of a mine, who carried the primary duties, and the persons employed in it. The Act also placed duties on the mine's employer in respect of contractors working in the mine. Enforcement was central, through the Directorate General of Mines Safety, and not left to the States as it was for factories.

What moved out of it

The subject matter now sits in the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020. The regulations made under the Act were to continue as the Code and its rules allow, until replaced. A mine operator reviewing its compliance should read the Code and the rules made under it, and check the Director General's current notifications.

What has changed, and when

The Act was amended from time to time and was in force in the form of its later amendments until the Code replaced it with effect from 21 November 2025. One provision of another Code still points back to it. Section 77(3) of the Industrial Relations Code, 2020 limits the permission regime for the largest establishments to a factory, a mine or a plantation, as defined in the Factories Act, 1948, the Mines Act, 1952 or the Plantations Labour Act, 1951. The firm's note on retrenchment records that all three Acts are repealed by the Occupational Safety Code, and that section 77(3) has not been updated to that Code's definitions.

What turns on it in practice

The Act is named on the site's note on retrenchment, lay-off and closure under the Industrial Relations Code and the 300-worker line. A mine is one of the three kinds of establishment to which the stricter permission regime applies, if it employed not less than three hundred workers on an average per working day in the preceding twelve months, or such higher number as the appropriate Government notifies. Whether a workplace is a mine is therefore a threshold question, and the definition in the Mines Act is where the Industrial Relations Code sends the reader.

For a mining client the Central Government is the appropriate Government in respect of mines, under section 2(b) of the Industrial Relations Code, so the central rules apply to retrenchment and closure there. For an earlier incident or inspection finding, the Act and its regulations remain the rule that measures the conduct, as the savings provisions allow.