DHARANGADHRA CHEMICAL WORKS Vs. WORKMEN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE appellant is a manufacturer of chemicals including soda ash. For the purpose of its manufacture the appellant requires common salt. It produces the salt so required in a salt work run by it at a place called Kuda in which a large number of persons is employed. In or about 1951, certain disputes arose between the appellant and the persons employed by it in its salt work. On 5 November 1951, the Government of the former State of Saurashtra where Kuda was situated, referred these disputes under S.10 of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, to an Industrial tribunal for adjudication. This appeal arises out of the award made by the tribunal on that reference.

(2.) IT will be useful at this stage briefly to describe the process of the manufacture of salt which is as follows : certain wells twenty to thirty feet deep and nine feet in diameter are dug in a land which the appellant has taken on lease and on which the salt work is situated. Brine collects in the wells by percolation, the land being salty, and is drawn out and stored in a sump. From the sump the brine is taken by a channel into another reservoir called the condenser. Here the brine is kept for sometime to increase its density in salt. The brine is then taken from the condenser by another channel to the salt pan. Here the brine gradually evaporates and salt is formed. The crust of salt so formed is then repeatedly broken and raked so that the desired size of crystals are finally formed, they are collected and wagons and carried away.

(3.) THE work is situated on a bare piece of salty land some distance away from any locality. The workmen come every year from distant villages at the commencement of the season and construct little huts near the work where they live with their families. They go away after the season is over.