THE ASSISTANT PROVIDENT FUND COMMISSIONER EMPLOYEES PROVIDENT FUND ORGANIZATION Vs. JOY THATTIL ITOOP

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Labour Welfare legislations in India are actuated by the express constitutional imperatives contained in the various Articles of Parts III and IV of the Constitution of India. The Employees Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952 (which will hereafter be referred to as "the Act" for brevity) has its parturition primarily in Article 41 which obligates the State, within the limits of its economic capacity, to make provisions for securing among other things, effective public assistance to employees suffering on account of unemployment, old age, sickness and disablement. Being an important legislation for labour welfare, attempts by establishments to find exemption from its applicability is met with certain resistance from the Competent Authority vested with various powers and supervisory jurisdiction under it. The case before us is no different.

(2.) This appeal has been filed by the Assistant Provident Fund Commissioner against the judgment of the learned single judge in W.P. (C) No.9475 of 2011, dated 7.12.2016, quashing an order of determination issued by him in proceedings initiated under section 7A of the Act, where under he had assessed the estates owned by the writ petitioners/respondents in this appeal as a single unit, thus bringing it under the sweep of the Act. The contention of the writ petitioners, which has found approval of the learned Single Judge, is that their estates are separate ones, which cannot be clubbed as one and that since each of them employ less than 20 employees, thus taking their establishments out of the rigour of the Act.

(3.) The genesis of the proceedings under Section 7A of the Act, as mentioned above, is that an estate comprised of 198 Acres called "The Kanjirappally Estate" situated at Vandiperiyar, which was originally owned by a certain Sri. K.E. Mathew, was registered as an establishment under the provisions of the Act and that after the death of Sri. K.E. Mathew, the said establishment was inherited by his heirs, thirteen in number, who then held the establishment as joint owners. The Provident Fund department continued to assess the establishment as a single Unit even after the death of Sri. K.E. Mathew on the assertion that the establishment was being held by his heirs as a single unit.