Case: J. C. Jain Vs. R. A. Pathak And Others

2. Civil Appeal No. 75 of 1956 which has been brought to this Court by special leave arises from a dispute between the General Manager of the Times of India Press, Bombay, owned by Bennet Coleman and Co. Ltd. (hereinafter called the appellant) and some of the employees in his service (hereinafter called the respondents). In November 1953, 1066 applications were made by the Vice-President of the Times of India, Indian Employees Union on behalf of some of the respondents before Mr. C. P. Fernandes, the authority appointed under the Act in which a claim was made for arrears of increments alleged to have been withheld by the appellant from July 1, 1951 to September 30, 1953, as also for increased dearness allowance from January 1, 1953 to August 31, 1953. The authority dealt with the whole group of the said applications as a single application under S. 16 (3) of the Act, and held that the claim made by the respondents for increased dearness allowance was not justified. In regard to the claim of arrears of increments alleged to have been withheld the authority rejected the claim made by 761 employees and allowed the same in respect of 305 employees. In the result the order passed by the authority on 31-12-1954 directed the appellant to deposit Rs. 22,698 for payment to the said 305 employees.      3. The direction thus issued by the authority gave rise to two appeals before the Small Cause Court at Bombay which is the appellate authority appointed under the Act. Appeal No. 1 of 1955 was filed by the appellant while Appeal No. 187 of 1954 was filed by the respondent. Meanwhile the question about the extent of the right conferred on the employer to prefer an appeal by S. 17(1) (a) of the Act had been considered by the Bombay High Court in Laxman Pandu v. Chief Mechanical Engineer, Western Railway, 57 Bom LR 399 : ( (S) AIR 1955 Bom 283  ); and it has been held that under the said section the employer gets a right of appeal only if the order of the authority under this Act awards payment of an amount of Rs. 300 or more in respect of a single individual worker; the right does not exist if the order awards a sum exceeding Rs. 300 collectively to an unpaid group of workers every one of whom gets an amount under S. 300. Following this decision the appellant authority held that the appeal preferred by the appellant was incompetent and so dismissed it. The appellant then applied for an obtained special leave from this Court to prefer an appeal against the said appellate decision; and so the main point raised by the appeal is about the construction of S. 17(1) (a) of the Act.

Court's reasoning:
6. sub-s. (2), and a direction has been issued for the payment of the specified amount, it is the said specified amount that must be considered in deciding whether the test prescribed by S. 17(1)(a) is satisfied or not.The view taken by the Bombay High Court, however, is that S. 17(1)(a) is applicable only where the amount directed to be paid to each single applicant exceeds Rs. 300.In other words, on this view the expression the total sum directed to be paid" used in S. 17 (1) (a) is construed to mean the total sum directed to be paid to each individual applicant, and that clearly involves the addition of certain words in the section. If the application is made by a single employee an appeal can be preferred by the employer against the direction issued in such an application if the total sum directed to be paid to the applicant exceeds Rs. 300; but if a single application is made on behalf of several employees belonging to the same unpaid group the test to be applied is not whether a direction has been issued that the employer should pay Rs. 300 or more to each one of the applicants; the test clearly is whether a direction has been issued on the said single application calling upon the employer to pay to the applicants Rs. 300 or more. Reading S. 17(1)(a) by itself we feel no difficulty in reaching this conclusion7. It is, however, urged that in construing S. 17 (1) (a) it would be relevant and material to compare and contrast its provisions with those of cl. (b) of S. 17, sub-s. (1). Providing for the right of an employee to make an appeal this clause requires that the total amount of wages claimed to have been witheld from him or from the unpaid group to which he belonged should exceed Rs. 50/-. It is emphasised that this clause refers expressly to the case of an individual employee as well as the case of employees belonging to an unpaid group; and the argument is that since cl. (a) does not use the words "unpaid group" it indicates that the direction about the payment of the amount prescribed by the said clause has reference to each individual employee. We are not impressed by this argument. Since the Act has provided for the making of a single application on behalf of a number of employed persons belonging to the same unpaid group as well as separate applications made by individual workmen it was unnecessary to refer to the persons employed in the unpaid group while providing for appeals against directions made under S. 15(3). On the other hand, if the Legislature had intended that the right to prefer an appeal should accrue to the employer only if Rs. 300/- or more are directed to be paid to each individual employee it would have used appropriate additional words in cl. (a). Therefore the argument based upon the use of the words "unpaid group" in cl. (b) is not of any assistance in construing cl. (a)8. We are also inclined to think that it could not have been the intention of the Legislature to confer on the employer the right to prefer an appeal only if Rs. 300/- or more are ordered to be paid to each one of the applicants. It is true that the policy of the Act is to provide for speedy remedy to the employees in respect of unauthorised deductions made by the employer or in respect of delayed wages; and with that object the Act provides for the appointment of the authority and prescribes the summary procedure for the decision of the claims; but it seems very unlikely that whereas an appeal by the employee has been permitted by cl. (b) whenever the amount in dispute happens to be Rs. 50/- or more in respect of an individual applicant or in respect of the unpaid group the Legislature could have intended that the employer should have no right of appeal against a direction made on a single consolidated application even though the total liability flowing from the said direction may exceed the specified amount of Rs. 300 by several thousands. In the present case the amount directed to be paid is more than Rs. 22,000 but it has been held that since each one of the employees is not ordered to be paid Rs. 300 or more there is no right of appeal. On general considerations, therefore, the conclusion which we have reached on a fair and reasonable construction of cl. (a) appears to be well-founded11. Incidentally, if one or more employees in the same unpaid group are paid an amount exceeding Rs. 300 and the rest are paid less than Rs. 300 on the alternative constructions, the employer would be entitled to make an appeal only in respect of a workman to whom more than Rs. 300 is ordered to be paid and not against the others though the total amount directed to be paid to them may exceed by far the amount of Rs. 300. In such a case, if the appeal preferred by the employer in respect of the amount ordered to be paid to some of the workmen succeeds that would leave outstanding two conflicting decisions, with the result that a large number of employees in the same unpaid group may get the amount under the direction of the authority while those who were awarded more than Rs. 300 by the authority would get a smaller amount under the decision of the appellant authority. We are referring to this anomalous aspect of the matter only for the purpose of showing that whether the words used in the relevant clause are clear and unambiguous considerations of a possible hypothetical anomaly cannot affect its plain meaning. That is why we prefer to leave anomalies on both sides out of account and confine ourselves to the construction of the words used in S. 17(1) (a). If the said words had been reasonably capable of two constructions it would have been relevant to consider which of the two constructions would avoid any possible anomalies. We would, therefore hold that the appellate authority was in error in dismissing the appeal preferred before it by the appellant on the ground that it was incompetent under S.17 (1) (a).