AMAL KR GHATAK Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These two Rules were issued on two writ petitions. These Rules have been heard together as they involve common questions of law on facts which are similar. Both the petitioners are the owners respectively of the two tea estates referred to in their petitions and both of them are challenging in their respective petitions orders passed by the State Government refusing to grant them the exemption prayed for under Section 36 of the payment of Bonus Act, 1965.

(2.) The Petitioners' case is that they had been carrying on the business of producing tea under very adverse circumstances. They are heavily indebted and they are maintaining their tea gardens under adverse economic circumstances due to low yield, poor quality of products, uneconomic areas, inaccessibility of the gardens and similar other circumstances. According to them in the reports of the National Council of Applied Economic Research it had been found that the petitioners are carrying on their business under heavy indebtedness and under adverse circumstances. The Petitioners claim that such being the condition of the business carried on by them, they applied in 1965 to the State Government for being exempted from the obligations under the said Bonus Act, 1965. The State Government sat over this application for more than one and a half years and ultimately disposed of the application by recording the following order: "With reference to your letter No. 1092/M-41 dated 125-9-1965 on the above subject, I am directed to say that Government do not consider your prayer for exemption from the provision of the payment of Bonus Act, 1965 to be justified". The order is cyclostyled and on both the petitioners similar orders have been served by the respondents in disposing of their applications for exemption under Section 36 of the said Bonus Act of 1965. It is the validity of these orders which is the subject-matter of challenge in these two rules.

(3.) These Rules are being contested by the Respondents and Mr. Sanyal and Mr. Das Gupta are appearing for the Respondents in the two rules.