Mumbai News: Labour Minister Akash Fundkar Launches New Certificate Course On Legal Framework & Discipline Management To Ease Court Burden

Mumbai: A new Certificate Course in Legal Framework & Discipline Management has been launched under the Labour Department at the Na. Me. Lokhande Maharashtra Labour Institute, the state’s only educational institution specializing in labor studies.

This course, designed for industry and establishment officials and employees, aims to equip them with skills in handling legal issues and discipline management within organizations.

According to Labour Minister Akash Fundkar, this course will significantly reduce the burden on courts by addressing many discipline-related issues at the establishment level.

"With trained human resources in legal and discipline management, most cases of misconduct will be resolved within companies, thus relieving the courts of their workload," Fundkar said during the inauguration of the course.

The event, held at Nariman Bhavan, was attended by several key figures including Principal Secretary of the Labour Department I.A. Kundan, Director of the Institute Roshani Kadam-Patil, Under Secretary Deepak Pokle, Under Secretary Swapnil Kapadnis, and Deputy Director Dr. Atul Naubade.

The institute, operating in Mumbai and Nagpur, offers postgraduate degrees, diplomas, and Ph.D. programs in labor studies. As part of a new academic policy, the previously offered postgraduate degree has been revamped and renamed to Master of Human Capital Management and Employee Relations (MHCM&ER), starting from the academic year 2023-24, under the affiliation of Mumbai University and Nagpur University.

The new policy, introduced in 2020, recommends short-term skill-based courses to address the lack of trained personnel in handling workplace discipline cases.

Currently, many such issues escalate directly to courts due to the shortage of trained officers within organizations. The new course has been developed to ensure that establishments have trained officers who can handle these cases internally.

Course Details:

. Duration: 4 months

. Modules: 4

. Classes: Saturdays or Sundays

. Eligibility: Graduates from any field

The course includes practical training; online classes are not available at present. The course is credit-based, and successful candidates will receive a certificate from the department.

Minister Fundkar emphasized that the course would play a crucial role in improving industrial relations and reducing the workload on the judiciary, while enhancing the overall efficiency of organizations in the state.