TAMIL NADU LABOUR WELFARE BOARD TEYNAMPET Vs. COUNCIL OF SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH NEW DELHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The Tamil Nadu Labour Welfare Board (hereinafter referred to as "Welfare Board") has preferred this writ appeal against the order of the learned Judge dated December 3, 1999 in W.P.No. 13340/1988.

(2.) By the said order, the learned Judge, presumed that the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi (in short "CSIR") and its unit Central Leather Research Institute (for brevity "Leather Research Institute") are Central Government Institutions and not covered by the Tamil Nadu Labour Welfare Act, 1972 (Act 36 of 1972), as amended by the Tamil Nadu Act 37 of 1982 with effect from September 15, 1982 and thereby, allowed the writ petition preferred by CSIR and Leather Research Institute in part and held that they are liable to pay their welfare fund contribution only for the period from 1973 to September 15, 1982.

(3.) The main plea taken by the Welfare Board is that the respondent Leather Research Institute, Adyar, Madras, being a place deemed to be a factory under sub-section 2 of Section 85 of the Factories Act, 1948 and being a factory as defined in clause (m) of Section 2 of the Factories Act, 1948, is an establishment within the meaning of Clause (d) of Section 2 of the Tamil Nadu Labour Welfare Fund Act, 1972 (Act 36 of 1972). Further, CSIR, a Society registered under the Societies Registration Act cannot be presumed to be an establishment of the Central Government, as presumed by the learned Judge.