UMEDSINGH HAMIRASINGH Vs. MARSDEN MILLS LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is a group of petitions under Art. 227 of the Constitution of India in respect of a judgment of the Labour Appellate Tribunal. The facts in all these petitions and the question of law to be decided being identical, the matters were dealt with at all stages by a single judgment, and, there fore, it would be convenient to dispose of these petitions also by a single judgment. But we will take the facts in Special Civil Application No. 3179 of 1956 as typical of the facts which exist in the other applications.

(2.) THE petitioners are employed in a canteen run by a co-operative society of the workers of the Marsden Mills, Ltd. , who are the first Respondents. In 1948, an award was made by the Industrial Court regarding the standardisation of wages of all employees employed in the textile industry at Ahmedabad. Subsequently there was a supplementary award regarding dearness allowance. The said award directed the textile mills to pay dearness allowance to contract labour on a certain basis. The petitioners claimed that they were entitled to such dearness allowance from the mill, and, therefore, made applications to the Labour Court, Ahmedabad, praying for a declaration that opponent No. 1 had committed an illegal change within the meaning of S. 46 of the Bombay Industrial Relations Act inasmuch as it had not carried out the terms of the award which were binding on it. The petitioners had also prayed for an order directing opponent No. 1 to withdraw the said illegal change by paying all the arrears of wages and dear ness allowance. The Labour Court held that the co-operative society, of which the petitioners were employees, was neither a contractor nor an agent of opponent No. 1, and, therefore, the Petitioners were not employees of opponent No. 1 within the meaning of S. 3 (sub-s. 13) of the Bombay Indus trial Relations Act. The petitioners filed an appeal to the Industrial Court, who confirmed the decision of the Labour Court. They then preferred an appeal to the Labour Appellate Tribunal, Bombay. A division bench of the Labour Appel late Tribunal referred three questions to a Full Bench. They are as follows: 1. Whether the decision of this Tribunal in Ahmedabad Mfg. and Calico Ptg. Co. , Ltd. v. Their Workmen, 1953-2 Lab LJ 647, requires re consideration in the light of the later decision of this Tribunal in Simplex Mills Co. v Their Work men, 1955-2 Lab LJ 46? 2. Whether the former decision has ceased to apply to the staff of canteens, the premises and equipment whereof have been provided by the mills but which are managed by Co-operative Societies started by the employees of the mills by reason of the amendments made by the State Government by Government Notification No. 44/8 dated 15-1-1954 in Rr. 76 to 78 of the Bombay Factories Rules, read in the light of S. 46 of the Factories Act, 1948? 3. Whether in any event, on the facts admitted by the parties in the present appeals, the Co-operative Societies which manage the canteens, the premises and equipment whereof have been provided by the mills concerned for their employees, can be regarded in law as the agents or in dependent contractors of the respective mills for maintaining or running the canteen, so as to allow the staff engaged by Co-operative Societies for the canteens to be regarded in law for the purposes of the Bombay Industrial Regulations Act as employees of the respective mills? the findings of the Full Bench on these three questions were: 1. That the Calico Mills case was rightly decided; 2. That the amendments to the rules made in January 1954 have made no difference to the responsibility of the employer for maintaining a can teen and the decision in the Calico Mills case is applicable; and 3. That the co-operative societies managing the canteens must be regarded in law as the con tractors of the respective mills within the meaning of sub-cl. (e) of Cl. (14) of S. 3 of the Bom bay Industrial Relations Act. (2a) The matter then went back to the Division Bench for disposal, and the Division Bench held that although the Full Bench had found that the petitioners were employees within the definition of S. 3, Sub-s. (13) of the Industrial Relations Act, they were not in the direct employment of opponent No. 1; that they were only entitled to such benefits as the Act had conferred upon them, but they were not entitled to wages and dearness allowance from opponent No. 1 under the award. The Division Bench, therefore, dismissed the appeal. It is against this dismissal that the petitioners have come to us on the plea that there is an error apparent on the face of the record in that the Division Bench failed to take into account the fact that the award had become binding on the employer and the employees under the Indus trial Relations Act and any obligation arising un der the award was an obligation enforceable under the Industrial Relations Act and, therefore, if the petitioners were employees within the meaning of S. 3 (13), they were entitled to enforce the obli gations under the award against opponent No. 1.

(3.) OPPONENT No. 1 on this petition inter alia challenges the finding of the Full Bench that the petitioners were employees and that opponent No. 1 was an employer of the petitioners, and says that if this is the true position in law, the question whether the Division Bench rightly distinguished between lights arising under the Act and rights arising out of direct employment would not survive. That, no doubt, would be so and we pro pose, therefore, in the first instance, to deal with this plea raised on behalf of opponent No. I.