RAMPUR DISTILLERY Vs. COMPETENT AUTHORITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) List is revised. Learned counsel for the parties appearing in Writ Petition No. 15796 of 1998 are present. In the connected Writ Petition No. 14638 of 1996, learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner is present but the learned counsel for the respondents who was heard earlier on January 5, 2006 and a date was fixed January 17, 2006 as the next date of hearing, did not care to appear on both the calls.

(2.) As the controversy involved in the Writ Petition No. 15796 of 1998 and the Writ Petition No. 14638 of 1996 being identical and the both the writ petitions are connected by the order dated May 21, 1998, the same are being heard and decided together by common order by taking the Writ Petition No. 15796 of 1998 leading case. The present proceedings arise out of an order dated April 3, 1998 passed by an authority under the Payment of Wages Act on an application made by the respondent No. 2, Labour Enforcement Officer, Varanasi under Section 15 of the Payment of Wages Act, 1936 (hereinafter referred to as the Act) claiming that 44 workmen who were engaged by the petitioner through a contractor in the bonded warehouse were being subjected to illegal deduction of wages because the petitioner was not paying to these 44 workmen minimum wages which ought to have been paid in pursuance of notification dated August 13, 1991 under the Payment of Wages Act.

(3.) The claim raised by the workman was that illegal deductions had been made from the period March, 1995 to February, 1996. The authority concerned has therefore directed the petitioner to pay a sum of Rs. 2,13,977.28 as wages and also imposed a penalty of Rs. 4,27,954.56 along with costs for a sum of Rs. 250/-.