The short answer: the most common arrangement in Indian households is 2–4 paid leaves per month, plus major festival days, with additional absences deducted at the per-day rate. There is currently no central law prescribing leave for domestic workers in India, so custom fills the gap — and the households that keep good staff for years are consistently the ones with a clear, slightly generous policy applied without renegotiation.
What the law says (and doesn't)
Domestic workers largely fall outside India's central labour codes on leave and working hours. A few states have included domestic workers in minimum-wage schedules, and some cities have welfare-board registrations, but for the practical question — "how many leaves is my maid entitled to?" — there is no statutory answer in most of the country as of 2026. That makes your household policy the de facto contract, which is precisely why it should be explicit and consistent rather than mood-based.
What households actually do
| Policy | How common | How it plays out |
|---|---|---|
| 2 paid leaves/month | The most common baseline | Fair and predictable; unused leaves usually lapse |
| 4 paid leaves/month | Common in metros, generous | Effectively one day a week; strong retention signal |
| No paid leaves, per-day deduction | Common but corrosive | Every absence becomes a negotiation; staff turnover is higher |
| Unlimited "adjusted" leave | Rare, informal homes | Ambiguity eventually damages both sides |
Beyond monthly leaves, custom in most regions adds: major festival days (Diwali, Eid, Holi, Pongal — per your region and her community, typically 3–6 days a year), and reasonable sick leave handled with flexibility rather than arithmetic.
How paid leave interacts with the salary formula
This is where most confusion lives. The rule is simple: a paid leave counts as a day present in the attendance-based salary formula; an unpaid absence counts as zero.
Example: salary ₹8,000, working-days base 26. Your maid takes 4 days off — 2 within the paid-leave allowance, 2 beyond it. Attendance = 22 worked + 2 paid leave = 24. Earned = 24 ÷ 26 × 8,000 = ₹7,385. Only the 2 excess days cost anything (₹307.69 each). Shown on a payslip, this reads as a rule being applied, not a punishment being decided.
Setting the policy: five recommendations
- State it at hiring, in one sentence. "2 paid leaves a month, festival days extra, other absences deducted at the daily rate." (Add it to the terms list in our hiring checklist.)
- Ask for notice, not permission. A call the previous evening is the reasonable ask. Same-morning silence is what the policy exists to discourage.
- Be humane about genuine illness. Deducting for a fever won't save you money; it will cost you a good worker. Many households treat up to a few sick days a year as paid, informally.
- Don't carry forward, don't cash out. Keep it simple: leaves reset monthly. Complexity is where disputes breed.
- Track leaves the same place you track attendance. A leave policy without an attendance record is unenforceable — and an attendance record makes it self-enforcing. In StaffAround, absences are one tap and the month-end slip does the arithmetic automatically.
Festivals, bonuses, and the long game
Festival leave and the customary annual bonus (commonly one month's salary at Diwali or the major festival of her community) are part of the same fabric: they're what make a household worth staying with. Staff who feel the rules are fair and the pay is punctual stay for years — the full argument is in how to keep good house help for years. A leave policy is cheap; replacing a trusted worker is not.