Rajendra Babu, J. - (1.) On the basis of a report made by the National Commission on Labour in the year 1966 in paragraph 9.10 to the effect that the practice of employing contract labour is prevalent in varying degree in almost all the industries and services. Since the system of employment of contract labour led to various abuses, the question of its abolition was accentuated. There had been consistent demand by the labour for abolishing the system of contract labour.
(2.) The dispute relating to contract labour or its absorption by the employer was, therefore, held to be an industrial dispute. (Standard Vacuum Refining Co. of India Ltd. vs. Its Workmen, (1960) 3 SCR 466. Thereafter industrial adjudication interfered to abolish or modify the system of contract labour in industrial undertakings depending on the facts arising in each case.
(3.) Then came on the scene the fate of contract workers in the canteen established as mandated under Section 46 of the Factories Act, 1947. In Saraspur Mills Co. Ltd. vs. Ramanlal Chimanlal, (1973) 3 SCR 967, in view of Section 46 of the Factories Act and rules made thereunder requiring an employer to provide a canteen in a factory where more than 250 workers are employed for the use of the workers even if run by a co-operative society were workmen of the factory as it was under a mandatory obligation to maintain and run the canteen. This question was more elaborately dealt with in M. M. R. Khan vs. Union of India, (1990) Suppl. SCC 191. In this case, this Court was concerned with canteen run by Railway establishments falling into three different categories : 1. Canteens compulsorily provided either pursuant to Section 16 of the Factories Act or under other enactment described as "statutory factories"; 2. Canteens set up as a staff welfare measure with the approval of the Railway Board in terms of Railway Establishment Manual; 3. Canteens established though as a staff welfare measure but without the approval of the Railway Board in terms of Railway Establishment Manual. ;