KOLHAPUR SUGAR MILLS LTD Vs. SYED TAKI BILGRAMI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a petition under Arts. 226 and 227 of the Constitution filed by the petitioner-company, which runs a sugar mill at Kolhapur and which also owns 79 acres of land on which, by rotation, sugarcane crop is grown by it, for a writ of certiorari or other appropriate writ or direction against respondent 1, who is the president of the industrial court, Bombay, quashing the award dated 28 October, 1966 made by him in this matter.

(2.) The facts necessary for the purpose of this judgment are that the petitioner-company originally owned an agricultural estate of 1,135 acres of land on which sugarcane was cultivated by it, but after the Maharashtra Agricultural Lands (Ceiling on Holdings) Act, 1951, was passed, under the provisions of that Act, a major part of the estate owned by the petitioner-company was taken over by the Government and handed over to the Maharashtra State Farming Corporation, leaving only 79 acres of agricultural land for the petitioner-company itself, as from 1 August, 1963. In pars 5 of the petition, it is stated that the factory of the petitioner-company has a crushing capacity of 2,200 tons per day, and that its total sugarcane requirements during the season are about 350,000 tons. It is further stated in the said paragraph that, on the 79 acres of land now left with the petitioner-company, only about 3,000 tons of sugarcane are grown per season which is roughly just one and a half day's crushing requirement of the factor of the petitioner-company with the result that the petitioner-company now obtains the entire balance of its supply of sugarcane from private agriculturists under certain agreements which it has entered into in that behalf. It is the case of the petitioner-company that, except for a special arrangement made by it for the year 1964-65 at the instance of the State Government itself, the petitioner-company is not concerned with the harvesting and transport of sugarcane on and from the fields of private cultivators from whom it obtains the bulk of its sugarcane requirements. Respondent 2 to this petition is a trade union which is a representative union of the employees, inter alia, of the petitioner-company's factory. On 13 August, 1964, respondent 2 union served a notice of change under the provisions of S. 42(2) of the Bombay Industrial Relations Act, 1946, making a demand that every cartman and harvester in the harvesting and transport of sugarcane in the petitioner-company should get a daily wage at the rate at which the unskilled employees of the petitioner-company are paid, with effect from the day of the commencement of the season 1964-65, and that the petitioner-company might revise the rates of contract for harvesting and transport suitably, if necessary. The dispute that was raised by the said notice of change was taken to conciliation, but the conciliator ultimately issued a failure certificate under S. 73A(iii) of the Bombay Industrial Relations Act, 1946, and a reference was thereafter made by respondent 2 union to the industrial court on 7 February, 1963. The respondent 2 union filed its statement of claim in that reference, and in that statement of claim it was stated that the complete operation of harvesting and transport of sugarcane was organized by the petitioner-company and that the harvesting programme was fixed by the company and the same was not left to the vagaries of those who sold their sugarcane to the company. It was, therefore, submitted that the harvesting and transport workers and whose employed through contractors and whose work was supervised and controlled by the staff of the petitioner-company were the employees of the petitioner-company within the terms of S. 3(13) of the Bombay Industrial Regulations Act, and the petitioner-company was, therefore, their employer and was bound to pay to them wages at the rate at which its unskilled employees were being paid. The petitioner-company filed a written statement in answer to that statement of claim in which it repudiated the demand made by respondent 2 union and contended that the harvesters and cartmen engaged on the lands of private cultivators ware not the employees of the petitioner-company and that the reference in that behalf was, therefore, not maintainable. In the said reference, which was numbered as Reference No. 25 of 1965 in the industrial court, the Maharashtra State Farming Corporation was made a party, admittedly, at the instance of the petitioner-company. It may be mentioned that the Maharashtra State Farming Corporation had also a reference of its own then pending in the industrial court, viz., Reference No. 2 of 1966. These two references, viz, Reference No. 25 of 1963 and Reference No. 2 of 1965, along with two other references, were heard together, and one composite award was made in regard to the said four references as, in the opinion of the president of the industrial Court, who made that award, the facts, the evidence as well as the legal points that arose, and the conditions of service and nature of the work of the employees concerned, were the same in all the references. It may, however, be mentioned that Paras. 2, 3, 5, 10, 11, 12 and 13 of the award relate to the claim made by respondent 2 union against the petitioner-company. In the said award, the industrial court rejected the contention of the petitioner-company that harvesting and transport workers in respect of the sugarcane obtained by the petitioner-company from the lands of private cultivators were not the employees of the petitioner-company, and it proceeded to make an award whereby it granted an increase of 50 per cent over the wages which were being earned by each koyta of harvesters, and the rate per mile payable to cartmen was also increased by 50 per cent. The petitioner-company has thereafter filed the present petition on 29 November, 1965 for the relief already set out by us above.

(3.) Four preliminary objections were raised by Sri Kulkarni who appeared for respondent 2 union to the present petition, and they were :