AHMEDABAD COTTON MFG CO LTD Vs. TEXTILE LABOUR ASSN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a petition filed by the Ahmedabad Cotton Manufacturing Co., Ltd., for itself and on behalf of the other local member Mills of the Ahmedabad Millowners Association, with leave under Order I, Rule 8, of the Civil Procedure Code, 1908, .against the respondents who are the Textile Labour Association having their office at Mirzapur Road, Ahmedabad, being an association registered as a Trade Union under the Trade Unions Act. Both the petitioners and the opponents have their registered offices outside the jurisdiction of this Court. The Ahmedabad Mill-owners Association has its registered office at Ahmedabad and all the members of that Association who are represented by the petitioners have their registered offices also at Ahmedabad. It appears that there was a dispute between the opponents and the Ahmedabad Millowners Association as regards the bonus equivalent to four months wages of the employees which was claimed by the opponents as payable by the various members of the Ahmedabad Millowners Association. No agreement could be reached land a notice in form M provided in the Bombay Industrial Disputes Act (Bom. XXV of 1938) was forwarded by the opponents to the Conciliator on February 1, 1945, and there was a notice of change given under the Act. The Chief Conciliator failed to bring about a settlement, concluded the proceedings on February 24, 1945, and made his report to the Government of Bombay, whereupon the Government of Bombay on April 9, 1945, issued a notification under Clause (2) of Section 49A of the Bombay Industrial Disputes Act referring the industrial dispute which had thus arisen between the Ahmedabad Millowners Association on the one hand and the opponents on the other to the arbitration of the Industrial Court constituted under Section 24 of the Bombay Industrial f Disputes Act.

(2.) The petitioners contended that the bonus as demanded by the opponents was not and could not legitimately be the subject-matter of demand under the said Act or of any conciliation, reference, recommendation or award, that the granting of the bonus whether calculated on the salary of the workers or on the profits of the employers or in any manner or form whatever was always a matter of the pure volition and free will of the employer and either in law or in principle it was not competent to the employee to claim a bonus as a matter of right, except only when the payment of any bonus was by way of extra remuneration payable under an express contract, that the claim to a bonus was not an industrial matter within the meaning of the said Act nor did the employer s refusal to pay it constitute or give rise to an industrial dispute, and therefore it was not competent to the opponents to give a notice under the said Act nor for the conciliator to act thereupon nor for the Government of Bombay to make any order under Clause (2) of Section 49A of the Act. They therefore contended that the Industrial Court had no jurisdiction to entertain the said demand or any matter relating thereto or to act under the said order of reference. They, therefore, prayed for an issue of a writ of certiorari calling upon the Industrial Court to send to this Court the record and papers in the above matter and to quash the said proceedings and for further and other reliefs.

(3.) On this petition filed by the petitioners, they applied for an interim stay of proceedings before the Industrial Court and made an application to me in the vacation on June 2, 1945. On that application I made an order that the question whether interim stay of proceedings before the Industrial Court should be granted or not should be argued before me on June 20, 1945, and I directed that notices in that behalf should issue to the opponents, I, however, in the meanwhile stayed all proceedings before the Industrial Court pending the hearing and final disposal of that application before me on June 20, 1945. The matter accordingly came on for hearing- before me on June 20, 1945, when Sir Jamshedji Kanga appeared for the Province of Bombay and applied that hie clients should be added as party-respondents to "the petition. The Advocate General for the petitioners opposed the application contending that the Province of Bombay had no lotus standi on this petition. On that day I made ah order that the rule and, portion should be served on the Province of Bombay by the petitioners, but without prejudice to the contention of the petitioners which they would be at liberty to advance at the hearing of the rule that the Province of Bombay nad no locus Standi to be heard on this rule. I reserved the costs of that "application which had been made by Sir Jamshedji Kanga. I also directed that the rule should be placed on my board for hearing and final disposal on July 16, 1945, and extended the interim stay which I had granted till the hearing and final disposal of the rule. The petitioners undertook on that occasion that in the event of the decision of the Court going against them they would file their written statement in the Industrial Court within forty-eight hours of the judgment delivered in the matter.