Mumbai, March 6: In a first for a major corporate house, engineering, procurement and construction major Larsen and Toubro on Thursday announced a one-day paid menstrual leave for women employees.

The move will benefit about 5,000 women employees at the city-headquartered company.

The company's chairman and managing director S N Subrahmanyan announced the move at a company event to celebrate International Women's Day, sources said. Exact details of how to implement the announcement will be formulated by the relevant officials shortly, they said. International Women’s Day 2025 Wishes, Images and HD Wallpapers for Free Download Online: Share Happy Women’s Day Greetings, Messages, Quotes and Photos on March 8.

The announcement is only applicable to the employees of the parent L&T and not for its subsidiaries engaged in financial services or technology, they said.

L&T has 60,000 employees, of which 9 per cent or about 5,000 are women, who will benefit from the move, which gets implemented immediately. The announcement comes within weeks of the company's top leader facing flak for comments asking employees to put in 90-hours a week and not keep staring at their wives. International Women’s Day 2025: PM Narendra Modi Lauds ‘Nari Shakti’ on Women’s Day; To Hand Over His Social Media Accounts to Women Achievers (Watch Video).

The company had later defended the remarks made during an internal virtual meeting as being in line with its nation-building mandate. Some companies like Swiggy and Zomato have made similar announcements on menstrual leaves in the past, but major business houses are yet to announce similar initiatives.

Four states - Bihar, Odisha, Sikkim and Kerala - have made provisions for menstrual leaves for their employees. The Supreme Court had last year suggested the government formulate a policy on the issue.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)