Gujarat Holidays 2026 & Attendance Compliance Guide

Gujarat operates under the Shops and Establishments (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 2019, a modern rewrite that lets shops run 24x7 with conditions. Employers can schedule up to 9 hours a day and 48 hours a week. Arjun Desai explains the 2026 holiday list, overtime math, and how Gujarat SMBs set up attendance in five minutes.

The Gujarat Shops Act of 2019 replaced the 1948 law and quietly changed how Surat textile units, Ahmedabad retailers, and Rajkot engineering shops run their rosters. The biggest shift: establishments with 10 or more workers can operate round the clock as long as women employees get consent-based night work protections and workers get the statutory rest day. This guide is the 2026 version for Gujarat founders and HR leads.

Gujarat’s calendar is unusual because it stretches Diwali across three paid days: Diwali, Nutan Varsh (Gujarati New Year), and Bhai Bij. Many non-Gujarati firms operating in the state forget this and end up with empty offices anyway. Plan for the three-day block.

The 2019 Act’s 10.5-hour spread-over is tighter than most other states. If a shift starts at 9 am with a 30-minute break, the worker must leave by 7:30 pm. Factories with split shifts need to watch this carefully.

How AttendFirst Helps Gujarat SMBs

AttendFirst is attendance + leave, nothing more. No payroll, no OT calculator, no spread-over enforcement. For Gujarat SMBs that means:

• Bulk-import ~20 pan-India gazetted holidays for 2026; add Diwali, Nutan Varsh, Bhai Bij, Uttarayan, and other Gujarat-specific dates as custom holidays
• Multiple shifts CRUD: model a 9-to-6 office shift alongside a rotational textile-unit shift and map them to the work schedule per day of the week
• Mobile check-in via GPS, selfie, or QR. Works on any phone as a PWA
• Multi-session day tracking so workers can log breaks separately from work sessions
• Daily and monthly reports with CSV export, the inspector-friendly register, downloadable in seconds

Setting Up Gujarat Attendance in 5 Minutes

1. Sign up at attendfirst.com. Free for up to 10 employees.
2. From Settings → Holidays, bulk-import the 2026 Indian holidays, then add Diwali, Nutan Varsh, and Bhai Bij as custom holidays.
3. In Settings → Working Hours, define one or more shifts (e.g., a 9-to-6 office shift).
4. Import employees via CSV or share the self-join link.
5. Employees check in from any phone via the PWA. No app download needed.

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Track Gujarat attendance the cheap way. AttendFirst is attendance-only, no payroll bundle, no per-user tax on growing teams. Free for up to 10 employees. Start Free.