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Minimum wages in Nagaland are fixed under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 and notified by the Labour Department, Government of Nagaland. The state uses three skill categories with consolidated daily rates applied statewide without a zone split. The operative notification dates from June 2019 and has not been revised since.
The short answer Minimum wages in Nagaland are ₹176 per day for unskilled work, ₹210 for semi-skilled and ₹235 for skilled, under the notification effective 14 June 2019. Only three grades are notified and the rates are consolidated, with no basic and dearness allowance split and no periodic revision mechanism. Monthly equivalents are not officially notified and must be derived – at 26 days that is ₹4,576 to ₹6,110, and at 30 days ₹5,280 to ₹7,050. Because these figures are likely to sit below the Central National Floor Wage, run that comparison before applying them.
Nagaland notifies consolidated daily rates only. There is no official monthly figure, so the monthly equivalent has to be derived, and compliance sources disagree on the multiplier – some apply 26 days, others 30. Overtime is paid at twice the ordinary rate. Before applying the notified figure, compare it against the Central National Floor Wage: where a state rate falls below the central floor, the higher figure governs, and with a 2019 schedule that comparison is likely to be decisive.
The mistake to avoid: applying the 2019 figure without running the national floor comparison. A stale notification remains the operative state schedule, but it does not override the central floor. In a state whose rates have not moved in seven years, the notified figure is the starting point for the calculation, not the answer to it.
Worked example – unskilled worker
Notified daily rate = ₹176 (consolidated, no VDA split)
Per month at 26 days = 176 × 26 = ₹4,576
Per month at 30 days = 176 × 30 = ₹5,280
Per hour at an 8-hour day = 176 ÷ 8 = ₹22.00
Then compare against the Central National Floor Wage – the higher figure governs
Nagaland notifies three skill categories rather than the four most states use, so a role that would sit in a highly skilled band elsewhere maps to skilled here. Classification follows the work actually performed rather than the designation on the appointment letter.
Act on this: classify against the definitions, then run the national floor comparison for every category. With the whole schedule spanning only ₹59 a day from bottom to top, the classification decision matters far less in Nagaland than the question of which floor actually applies.
Minimum wages in Nagaland apply to workers in the scheduled employments notified by the state government, and coverage does not depend on headcount. Shops and commercial establishments, construction, transport, hospitality and services account for most covered employment in the state. Contract workers are covered on the same footing as directly employed staff, and where a contractor pays below the applicable floor the principal employer carries the liability.
Paying below the applicable floor exposes an employer to recovery of the shortfall for the whole affected period, compensation on top, and prosecution. Under the Code on Wages, 2019 a first offence attracts a fine of up to ₹50,000, and a repeat offence within five years can mean up to three months imprisonment and a fine of up to ₹1 lakh. Claims reach back three years.
Act on this: document the floor comparison in writing each year. In a jurisdiction where the state schedule is visibly out of date, an employer who can show they checked the state notification against the central floor and applied the higher figure is in a materially stronger position than one who simply applied the 2019 number.
The Labour Department, Government of Nagaland fixes minimum wages under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948. Under the statutory framework the appropriate government reviews and revises rates at intervals not exceeding five years. The operative notification took effect on 14 June 2019 and no subsequent revision has been identified, which places the schedule beyond that five-year window and makes it the most dated in the country.
Act on this: write to the Labour Department for the current position rather than relying on a rate database. If a revision has been issued and not widely republished, you need it; if none has been issued, you need that confirmed in order to justify applying the central floor instead.
Notification position for minimum wages in Nagaland.
| Effective From | Structure | Unskilled / Day | Skilled / Day |
|---|---|---|---|
| 14 Jun 2019 | Three skill categories, consolidated daily rates, no zones | ₹176 | ₹235 |
| Since 2019 | No revision identified in published sources | – | – |
| Statutory review | At intervals not exceeding five years under the Act | – | – |
Monthly equivalents are not officially notified. Aggregators disagree on the multiplier: at 26 days the figures are ₹4,576, ₹5,460 and ₹6,110; at 30 days they are ₹5,280, ₹6,300 and ₹7,050. Where a notified rate falls below the Central National Floor Wage, the higher floor applies. Cross-verified against compliance-maintained datasets, July 2026. Always confirm against the official notification of the relevant State Labour Department before finalizing payroll.
Nagaland notifies the lowest wage floor in India by a substantial margin, and the gap is a function of time rather than policy – the schedule simply has not been revised since 2019 while every neighbouring state has moved on. For any employer, the operative question in Nagaland is which floor applies, not which grade.
Unskilled minimum wage per day, compared with other states. Comparison figures are to be filled from each state’s own notification.
| State / Benchmark | Unskilled / Day | Structure |
|---|---|---|
| Nagaland | ₹176 | Consolidated daily rate, three grades, unrevised since 14 Jun 2019 |
| Arunachal Pradesh – Area I | ₹200 | Consolidated ₹6,000 a month, unrevised since 2016 |
| Tripura | ₹310.65 | Basic ₹7,123 + VDA ₹954 a month, statewide |
| Assam | ₹398.23 | Basic ₹7,200 + VDA ₹3,154 a month, statewide |
| Meghalaya | ₹555 | Basic ₹525 + VDA ₹30 a day, revised half-yearly |
| National Floor Wage | – | Advisory floor; where a state rate falls below it, the higher figure applies |
Act on this: Meghalaya, immediately to the west, pays more than three times the Nagaland unskilled rate and revises every six months. If you operate across the North East, Nagaland is the jurisdiction where a regional rate band is most likely to be lawful in Nagaland and unlawful nowhere else – but also the one where the state figure is least likely to be the operative floor.
The table below sets out minimum wages in Nagaland by skill category, effective 14 June 2019 and still the operative state notification. Rates are notified per day only; monthly figures are derived and are shown at both the 26-day and 30-day conventions because published sources disagree.
| Skill Category | Per Day | Per Month (×26) | Per Month (×30) | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unskilled | ₹176 | ₹4,576 | ₹5,280 | Consolidated, no VDA split |
| Semi-Skilled | ₹210 | ₹5,460 | ₹6,300 | Consolidated, no VDA split |
| Skilled | ₹235 | ₹6,110 | ₹7,050 | Consolidated, no VDA split |
| Highly Skilled | – | – | – | Not notified – only three grades in the schedule |
Source: Labour Department, Government of Nagaland – notification effective 14 June 2019 under the Minimum Wages Act, 1948. Rates are notified per day; monthly equivalents are not officially notified. Where a notified rate falls below the Central National Floor Wage, the higher floor applies and should be paid. Cross-verified against compliance-maintained datasets, July 2026. Always confirm against the official notification of the relevant State Labour Department before finalizing payroll.
No. Nagaland notifies one set of consolidated rates applying across the whole state, with no zone or district split.
Because Nagaland has no wage zones, the notified rate is the same everywhere in the state. A worker in Kohima, Dimapur, Mokokchung or a rural district reads the same schedule, and the only state-level variable is the skill category. Dimapur holds most of the state’s commercial establishments and therefore most of the covered workforce, but the notified figure it applies is identical to the one reaching a shop in an interior district. What differs in practice is market rates, which in Dimapur run well above the 2019 statutory floor.
Minimum wages in Nagaland are ₹176 per day for unskilled work, ₹210 for semi-skilled and ₹235 for skilled, under the notification effective 14 June 2019. Monthly equivalents are not officially notified — at 26 days that is ₹4,576 to ₹6,110. Compare against the Central National Floor Wage before applying these figures.
The operative notification took effect on 14 June 2019 and no subsequent revision has been identified in published sources. That places the schedule outside the five-year review window the Minimum Wages Act contemplates and makes it the most dated state schedule in India.
Three — unskilled, semi-skilled and skilled. There is no separate highly skilled band, so a role that would fall in a fourth tier in another state maps to skilled here, and supervisory staff remain within the schedule.
Where a state-notified rate falls below the Central National Floor Wage, the higher figure applies and must be paid. Given the schedule dates from 2019, this comparison is likely to be decisive in Nagaland rather than a formality, and it should be run and documented before payroll is set.
It has to be derived, because Nagaland notifies daily rates only and no official monthly figure exists. Compliance sources disagree on the multiplier — 26 days gives ₹4,576 for unskilled work and 30 days gives ₹5,280. Apply one divisor consistently and document which.
No. Nagaland notifies one set of consolidated rates across the whole state with no zone or district split, so the same figure applies in Kohima, Dimapur and every rural area. Skill category is the only state-level variable.
Alpesh Vaghasiya (CEO)
Alpesh Vaghasiya is the Co-founder and CEO of Superworks, a smart business management solution that Indian SMBs and large enterprises use to run attendance, payroll, and statutory compliance from a single system. He has spent over 15 years building software out of Surat, founding Artoon Solutions, now a 350+ person product engineering firm serving clients across 30+ countries, in 2009, before launching Superworks in 2020.
His writing comes from the operator's side of compliance - what actually breaks when payroll has to absorb a minimum wage revision, reconcile attendance across multiple sites, or file returns under different state rules in the same month. A Charter Member of TiE Surat and an active angel investor in early-stage Indian startups, he holds a B.E. in Computer Engineering from Gujarat University.
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