POSH India Help LogoPOSH India Help
Skip to statutory text

Chapter III · Local Committee

Section 5

Notification of District Officer

Statutory textCounsel-reviewed publication
The appropriate Government may notify a District Magistrate or Additional District Magistrate or the Collector or Deputy Collector as a District Officer for every District to exercise powers or discharge functions under this Act.

Transcribed from the official India Code source for reading and comparison. PIH plain-language guidance is editorial and separate; this page is not legal advice.

Source: India Code, Ministry of Law and Justice, Government of IndiaRetrieved: 2026-09-10India Code PDF, p. 6India Code PDF — last updated 31 August 2021

Plain Language

The appropriate Government may notify a District Officer for every district. This supplies the administrative anchor for the Local Committee system.

This section identifies the District Magistrate, Additional District Magistrate, Collector or Deputy Collector who may be notified as the District Officer. It does not contain the nodal-officer or seven-day forwarding mechanism; those duties appear in Section 6(2).

Why It Matters

The notification supplies the district-level authority that later constitutes and supports the Local Committee under Section 6 and performs duties under Section 20.

The complaint-intake network is a separate Section 6(2) mechanism. Keeping the mapping separate matters because Section 5 only concerns notification of the District Officer.

Practical Example

Scenario: A domestic worker in a small town wants to file a complaint but her employer has fewer than ten workers and there is no IC.

Outcome: After the District Officer has been notified, the Section 6(2) nodal-officer network provides an intake and forwarding route. The nodal officer must forward the complaint to the Local Committee within seven days.

Who Must Act

government

  • Exercise the statutory power to notify a District Magistrate, Additional District Magistrate, Collector or Deputy Collector as a District Officer for a district.

district officer

  • Exercise powers and discharge functions under the Act.

Compliance

✓

Notify an eligible District Officer for a district under the Act

Actor: Appropriate Government (statutory power) · Rule: Section 5

Timelines

District Officer notification: No statutory period in Section 5

Section 5 does not prescribe a complaint-forwarding deadline. The seven-day forwarding period belongs to the nodal-officer mechanism in Section 6(2).

Common Mistakes

✗

Treating the District Officer as an automatically identified office-holder without checking the notification made under Section 5.

✗

Attributing the nodal-officer network or seven-day forwarding deadline to Section 5 rather than Section 6(2).

Related Sections

§6Constitution and jurisdiction of Local Committee — The District Officer notified under Section 5 constitutes the Local Committee under Section 6§7Composition, tenure and other terms of Local Committee — The District Officer nominates members of the Local Committee under Section 7§20Duties and powers of District Officer — Section 20 elaborates on the District Officer's monitoring and awareness duties

Source & Status

Source and review statusPublication ready
Source version
India Code PDF — last updated 31 August 2021
Source location
India Code PDF, p. 6
Retrieved

View the official record page

Statutory blocks are kept separate from PIH plain-language and operational guidance. The reading copy is not legal advice.

Legal review status: counsel-reviewed. All sections have valid documentary counsel evidence and publication signals are enabled.

Judicial material: no verified judicial interpretation is published in this reading copy. Judicial analysis is a separate layer from the statutory transcription and PIH editorial guidance.