Manual material handling (MMH) is one of the demanding tasks in the rice mills and therefore it is being performed by the male workers. A study was carried out to develop work rest cycle for different tasks in the rice mills. A total of eight rice mills and three subjects from each mill were selected for the study. The rest allowance required after the MMH task was calculated using Murrell’s equation. The heart rate (HR) of the workers was measured for seven different MMH tasks. The mean working HR during MMH tasks in rice mill varies from 109 to 129 bpm. Work rest cycle required for different tasks was considerably different. Filling rice bags required minimum rest time however carrying 50 kg rice bag required maximum time in all the seven selected tasks. The rest allowance varied from 10.5% to 63.1% of the total work time.