Gururaj Shenoy vs The Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner. and ohers. Writ Petition 11249/2015 decided on 9 October 2020. Justice N.S. Sanjay Gowda.
Judgment Link: http://judgmenthck.kar.nic.in/judgmentsdsp/bitstream/123456789/343703/1/WP11249-15-09-10-2020.pdf
Relevant Paragraphs: 4. In all these writ petitions, the validity of the orders passed in favour of the contract labour working at the Food Storage Depot at Udupi and Mysuru, whereby they are entitled for the same wages and the same service conditions on par with the other labour engaged under the No Work No Pay system in the Food Storage Depot of FCI at Udupi and Mysuru and the Direct Payment system being paid at Food Storage Depot FCI at K.R.Nagar and Nanjangud, are under challenge by the FCI and also by a Contractor, who had supplied labour to the FCI.
9. The FCI, as recorded by the Authority in its order at paragraph 2, admitted that the labour engaged through the Contractors and the labour paid through the Direct Payment system were doing the same work.
14. The Competent Authority, on consideration of the stand taken by the FCI, proceeded to record a finding that the labour working at Mysuru and Udupi were doing the same and similar nature of work as the labour working in the depots of FCI at K.R.Nagar and Nanjangud under the Direct Payment system and so also the labour working in the Food Storage Depot at Gadikoppa and Shivamogga under the No Work No Pay system and they were, therefore, entitled to be paid wages and be provided with the service conditions on par with the labour working under the Direct Payment system in K.R.Nagar and Nanjangud and under No Work No Pay system in Gadikoppa and Shivamogga.
23. Thus, from the facts narrated above, the principal question that arises for consideration in these writ petitions is: “Whether the FCI can pay only minimum wages to the labour engaged through the contractors under the shield of a Labour Contract and thereby deprive the labour who are doing the same or similar work as other labour in other Depots, the wages and the service conditions that the labour in the other depots were being given?”
32. In view of the above fact, the further question that would arise for consideration is that, when the FCI decide to engage labour through a Contractor, whether they could resort to payment of merely the minimum wages and thereby get over the requirement of paying to the labour wages on the Equal Pay for Equal Work principle. In other words, whether the FCI could pay different wages to the labour who were engaged in discharging the same nature of work, merely because some of the labour were engaged through a Contractor.
41……even in respect of labour supplied through a Contractor, the mandate of the law is that those labour supplied by the Contractor would have to be necessarily paid the same rate of wages and be given the same benefit of the same service conditions as that of the labour who had been directly employed by the principal employer who were discharging the same or similar nature of work.
44. If the law itself mandates that a Contractor, who is licensed to supply contract labour, should pay the same rate of wages and provide the same service conditions to his labour as the labour directly employed by the principal employer, the principal employer cannot get over this statutory mandate by entering into a contract which stipulates that the Contractor would only be required to pay minimum wages and thereby defeat the constitutional principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work.
46.A Contract is basically an agreement between two consenting parties, who are competent to contract and who have entered into an agreement for a lawful consideration and with a lawful object. If the consideration or object of the contract is to do an act which is forbidden by law or is of such a nature that if it is permitted, would result in defeating the provisions of any law, then such a Contract, in law, is void (vide Section 10 and Section 23 of the Indian Contract Act).
50. ..the provisions of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970 would override any agreement that has been entered into between the principal employer and the Contractor, in respect of payment of wages to labour on the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work.
58. The FCI, being a public sector undertaking, cannot seek to avoid its liability to pay the same wages to all its workers engaged in the task of loading and unloading in its depots, by resorting to a contract which basically nullifies a statutory term of the license. It is, therefore, necessary that the FCI be directed to pay the difference of wages that becomes payable to the labour under the impugned orders by applying the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work.
Compiled by S.Basavaraj, Daksha Legal.
Daksha Legal 