NAGPUR HOTEL OWNERS ASSOCIATION Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this petition under Article 226 of the Constitution, the petitioners have prayed that two notifications under the Minimum Wages Act, as locally amended, should be quashed.

(2.) ACTING under section 3 read with section 5 (2) of the Minimum Wages Act, the State of Maharashtra issued a notification on the 9th of September 1963 whereby the minimum wages for skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled labourers employed in residential hotels, restaurant or eating house were fixed. On the 1st of October 1963, the State Government issued another notification under section 30 (2) (c) of the Minimum Wages Act for determining the computation of the cash value of the wages which are permitted to be paid in kind to these works. The petitioner No. 1 is the Nagpur Hotel Owners' Association and the petitioners No. 2 and 3 are owners of hotels which are run at Nagpur. These three petitioners contend that the said notifications are ultra vires of the powers vested in the Government and, therefore, they ought not to be enforced. the State of Maharashtra have contended that the notifications are perfectly valid and there is no reason or ground to interfere with them.

(3.) BEFORE we proceed to consider the submissions of the respective Advocates in this connection, it will be useful to trace the history of the legislation. "minimum Wages Act," so far as it concerns the employees in residential hotels, restaurants or eating houses. The Central Act No. 11 of 1948 was passed to provide for fixing minimum rates of wages in certain employments. This subject of the enactment was under entry No. 27 in the Concurrent Legislative List (List No. III) in the Government of India Act, 1935. Initially, only twelve classes of employment were mentioned in the first part of the schedule. Under section 27 of the Minimum Wages Act, the State Government were given power to include in this rates of wages could be fixed. According the residential hotels, restaurant or eating house" as defined in the Bombay Shops and Establishments Act, 1948, as item No. 13 in Schedule 1, Part 1, on the 26th of August 1954. Under the original Minimum Wages Act, section 3 (1) had three subclauses (I), (ii) and (iii) with respect to the employments specified in Part I of the Schedule, employments specified in Part II of the Schedule and employments added subsequently under S. 27, of Section 3 (1) with respect to employments specified in Part II of the Schedule (which relate mostly to agricultural employments) the State Government were given power of fixing minimum rates of wages under that sub-clause either for the whole State or for a part of the State, but no such proviso was added to the other two sub-clause of section 3 (1) in the original Act.