“The petitioner was virtually treated as ‘spare capacity’, to be placed wherever a colleague could be persuaded to take her.” With these unusually stark words, the Delhi High Court captured a workplace problem that often remains hidden behind unchanged salaries, intact designations and apparently neutral restructuring decisions. The Court found that the petitioner’s position had been filled while she was on maternity leave without informing or consulting her, and that serious thought about where she would be placed began only days before she was due to return.
The Delhi High Court has made it clear that maternity protection does not end with sanctioned leave, continued salary or retention of a job title.
Synopsis
- Background of the Case
- From Managerial Role to a Different Assignment
- The Employer’s Defence
- Is a Writ Maintainable Against a Private Employer?
- Maternity Protection Goes Beyond Leave and Salary
- Same Designation Does Not Necessarily Mean Same Status
- Constitutional Protection of Motherhood
- Right to Return to the Same or Equivalent Position
- What Went Wrong in the Present Case?
- Compensation Awarded by the Delhi High Court
- Directions for a Stronger Maternity Protection Framework
- Conclusion
Background of the Case
The petitioner, Rakhi Bisht, was a Chartered Accountant with approximately 14 years of professional experience. She was appointed as Manager, Accounting by respondent no. 2 in 2022 at a monthly salary of ₹2.60 lakh. She informed the management about her pregnancy in May 2023.
According to her case, her professional responsibilities began changing after the disclosure of pregnancy. In September 2023, she was moved to a different team, although she claimed she accepted the arrangement on assurances that she would return to her original role after maternity leave.
She proceeded on maternity leave in December 2023 and returned in July 2024. It was then that the real dispute arose.
The petitioner was told that her previous position was no longer available. She was instead assigned work in the Treasury Department. According to her, this work was substantially different from the managerial accounting role for which she had been employed and involved functions traditionally undertaken at a much lower level.
Before maternity leave, she claimed that five employees reported to her. After returning, she allegedly had no reporting staff and remained excluded from managerial meetings for a considerable period.
The dispute, therefore, was not simply about whether maternity leave had been granted. It was about whether the employee who returned from that leave returned to the same professional standing.
From Managerial Role to a Different Assignment
The petitioner repeatedly sought restoration of her earlier responsibilities. She also complained about the non-availability of a crèche facility. She eventually raised her grievances formally with the employer, followed by a legal notice.
Another important allegation concerned career progression. While her male counterparts were allegedly promoted to Senior Manager, she claimed that she continued to wait for restoration to her previous role. She characterised the treatment as pregnancy and maternity-based discrimination, post-maternity demotion and denial of equal professional opportunities.
By the time the matter was considered, however, the petitioner had resigned from the respondent company and joined another multinational company. Consequently, some of the original reliefs, including reinstatement, had become infructuous.
But the broader legal question survived: can an employer retain a woman’s salary and designation after maternity leave while substantially reducing the actual content and status of her job?
The Employer’s Defence
The employer denied that any demotion or discrimination had occurred. Its case was that the petitioner remained Manager–Accounting at the same managerial level, continued to receive the same salary and seniority, and had even received a 10% annual increment. The Treasury assignment, it argued, was temporary and involved investment accounting and currency revaluation functions commensurate with her experience.
It further relied on organisational restructuring following a global corporate acquisition and maintained that internal allocation of work was part of legitimate managerial decision-making.
The employer’s central legal argument was particularly important: Section 12 of the Maternity Benefit Act, according to it, protects a woman against dismissal, discharge or adverse changes connected with termination, but does not prevent ordinary internal reassignment of work.
The Court ultimately rejected such a narrow understanding of maternity protection.
Is a Writ Maintainable Against a Private Employer?
A preliminary issue was whether the Delhi High Court could entertain a writ petition concerning a private employer.
The Court acknowledged that the respondent company was a private commercial entity and was not “State” under Article 12. An ordinary dispute arising purely from a private contract of employment would ordinarily remain outside public law.
But this case involved something more. The petitioner was seeking enforcement of Section 12 of the Maternity Benefit Act, not merely a term of her employment contract. The statutory obligation applied independently of the contract. Section 27 of the Act also gives the legislation overriding effect over inconsistent contractual terms.
The Court consequently held that a statutory obligation of this character could not be bypassed merely by describing the dispute as one concerning private employment. A writ could lie to compel performance of a statutory function or positive obligation of a public nature. The petition was therefore maintainable.
The Court also considered the broader constitutional dimension of the dispute, observing that the case raised the question:
“whether the constitutional promise of equality and dignity for working women survives after childbirth and whether maternity can become a basis for professional disadvantage in the workplace.”
That formulation became the foundation of the judgment.
Maternity Protection Goes Beyond Leave and Salary
The most consequential part of the ruling is the Court’s interpretation of Section 12 of the Maternity Benefit Act, 1961.
The provision prohibits an employer from varying the conditions of service of a woman to her disadvantage during the protected period. The Court refused to read “conditions of service” as being confined to dismissal, salary or formal designation.
It held that a purposive and beneficial interpretation necessarily covers adverse employment action such as reduction in managerial or supervisory authority, substantially inferior reassignment, denial of promotional opportunities and withdrawal of significant responsibilities.
The Court put the principle plainly:
“The legislative intent is clear, a woman employee cannot be placed in a worse position because she exercised her statutory right to maternity leave.”
This considerably changes the lens through which maternity discrimination must be examined. An employer cannot necessarily answer an allegation of maternity disadvantage merely by producing a salary slip and showing that the employee’s designation remained unchanged.
Same Designation Does Not Necessarily Mean Same Status
The Court recognised the possibility of what may be described as a substantive demotion without a formal demotion.
A woman may continue to receive exactly the same salary. Her designation may remain intact. Yet her team may disappear, her supervisory authority may be removed, important assignments may be taken away and her prospects of promotion may diminish.
On paper, nothing has changed. Professionally, almost everything may have changed. The Court specifically addressed this problem. It noted that the statute does not expressly describe situations where designation and remuneration remain untouched. Still, the employee is deprived of managerial authority, supervisory responsibilities, decision-making powers, professional standing or meaningful opportunities for advancement.
But permitting employers to rely on such formal compliance, the Court held, would defeat the legislation.
“The law cannot be construed in a manner that allows its substantive guarantees to be circumvented through formal or cosmetic compliance.”
The Maternity Benefit Act, the Court emphasised, is not merely intended to preserve wages. It protects the dignity of motherhood, women’s economic security and their ability to continue their professional lives without being penalised for pregnancy.
Thus, maintaining the same salary and title while stripping an employee of the meaningful attributes of her office can still violate maternity protection.
Constitutional Protection of Motherhood
The Court did not treat maternity protection as an isolated labour-law entitlement. It connected the statutory protection with Articles 14, 15, 21 and 42 of the Constitution.
Article 14 protects equality and guards against arbitrary disadvantage. Article 15’s prohibition against sex discrimination encompasses discrimination arising from pregnancy and maternity. Article 21 protects dignity, livelihood and reproductive autonomy, while Article 42 specifically reflects the constitutional commitment towards just and humane conditions of work and maternity relief.
The Court held that professional disadvantage caused solely by pregnancy or maternity leave cannot be reconciled with these constitutional guarantees.
In particularly clear terms, it observed that pregnancy and maternity cannot become grounds for “professional disadvantage, demotion, loss of status, or denial of career progression.”
The judgment also considered CEDAW and the ILO Maternity Protection Convention, noting the international recognition of a woman’s right to return to the same or an equivalent position without maternity becoming a source of discrimination.
Right to Return to the Same or Equivalent Position
The Court distilled these constitutional, statutory and international principles into a significant return-to-work guarantee.
It held:
“Woman returning from maternity leave is entitled to be restored to the same position, or at the very least to an equivalent position carrying substantially similar status, responsibilities, authority, promotional avenues, and prospects of career progression.”
This does not mean that an employer can never restructure its organisation while an employee is on maternity leave. Businesses may undergo genuine reorganisations. Positions may legitimately disappear. Operational requirements can change.
But maternity leave cannot itself become the opportunity to permanently displace the employee. If the earlier post genuinely ceases to exist for bona fide organisational reasons, the alternative must be genuinely equivalent—not merely equal in salary.
Equivalence must be examined in terms of pay, grade, status, role, responsibilities, managerial authority and prospects for advancement.
What Went Wrong in the Present Case?
Interestingly, the Court did not finally determine whether the Treasury role itself was objectively inferior to the petitioner’s previous role. It considered that question to require an evidentiary inquiry inappropriate for the writ proceedings.
Instead, the Court concentrated on the admitted circumstances surrounding her return. Her former position had been filled while she was away on maternity leave. She had not been informed or consulted. Her return to that position was effectively foreclosed. Planning about what work she would perform apparently occurred only shortly before she resumed duty.
The employer’s own explanations were also found inconsistent. The Court noted that it had failed to provide a single coherent account of what had happened to her position and why.
Most significantly, when she returned, inquiries were being made internally about whether colleagues had “something” or “anything” that could be assigned to her.
That led to the Court’s striking description of her treatment as “spare capacity.” The Court held that this conduct could not be reconciled with the dignity inherent in Section 12’s maternity protection.
Compensation Awarded by the Delhi High Court
Since the petitioner had already left the organisation, restoration to her former position was no longer a meaningful remedy. The Court instead considered compensation.
It recognised that the harm was not readily measurable. It included indignity, loss of professional standing, anxiety caused by repeatedly seeking an explanation and rehabilitation, diminished standing among colleagues and ultimately relinquishing employment.
Considering her professional experience and salary, the Court directed respondent no. 2 to pay ₹10 lakh as compensation, approximately equivalent to four months’ salary, together with ₹1.5 lakh as costs.
The amount must be paid within eight weeks, failing which it would carry interest at 9% per annum from the date of judgment until realisation.
Directions for a Stronger Maternity Protection Framework
The judgment goes beyond the petitioner’s individual case. The Court found that maternity protection cannot be considered complete merely because leave and monetary benefits are available. Meaningful reintegration after maternity leave is equally important. It noted the absence of a comprehensive framework dealing specifically with post-maternity reintegration.
The Court therefore directed the Union of India to exercise its powers under Sections 149, 150 and 154 of the Code on Social Security, 2020 and, after appropriate consultation, formulate rules, schemes or directions dealing with matters including pregnancy-related accommodation, protection of role and status after maternity leave, lactation support, crèche facilities, grievance timelines, safeguards against retaliation and authorities competent to decide complaints and grant urgent interim protection.
The exercise has been directed to be completed within six months. The judgment also makes an important distinction between voluntary flexibility and imposed disadvantage. A woman may herself request altered duties, hours, workplace arrangements or another role because of post-maternity circumstances. Such a request cannot subsequently be treated as consent to a diminished service condition or used adversely in appraisal, increment or promotion decisions.
Conclusion
Rakhi Bisht v. Union of India & Anr. shifts the legal conversation from maternity leave to maternity equality. The difference is important. Granting leave protects a woman’s employment during childbirth; protecting her role, authority and career prospects ensures that exercising that right does not cost her the career she had built before childbirth.
The Delhi High Court has therefore rejected a purely formal understanding of maternity protection. Same salary is not enough. Same designation is not enough. What matters is whether the woman returns with substantially the same professional standing, meaningful responsibilities, authority and prospects for advancement.
As the Court declared, the statutory protection extends beyond continuity of employment and wages to ensuring that a woman resumes work without substantive disadvantage to her “professional status, responsibilities, authority, or prospects of career advancement” merely because of pregnancy or maternity leave.
The principle emerging from the judgment is consequently simple but far-reaching: maternity leave is a statutory protection, not a professional trade-off. Motherhood cannot lawfully become the price a woman pays for losing her place on the career ladder.