JUDGMENT
Gitesh Ranjan Bhattacharjee, J.
1. This writ petition has been filed by the Damodar Valley Corporation Workers’ Union
and by the President and the Secretary of the said trade union. The petitioner No. 3 is also a workman of the D.V.C. Co-operative Stores and Canteen Ltd. (respondent No. 4). The petitioner No. 1 is a registered trade union of the workers of the D.V.C. Co-operative Stores and Canteen situated in the Head Office premises of Damodar Valley Corporation “at Calcutta. The writ petition has been filed on the contention that the employees of the D.V.C. Co-operative Stores and Canteen, listed in the chart annexure-A to the writ petition, are being given only consolidated monthly salary on no work no pay basis but they are entitled to get regular pay and other benefits like gratuity, pension, provident fund etc. like the other employees of the D.V.C. It is the contention of the petitioners that the canteen is actually run and controlled by the Damodar Valley Corporation (D.V.C.) through the agency of the Co-operative society namely the D.V.C. Employees’ Co-operative Stores and Canteen Ltd.(respondent No. 4). It is also the contention of the petitioners that the D.V.C. for the benefit of the members of the staff and its officers, runs the canteen through the intermediary, the Co- operative society, comprised of employees of D.V.C. Their grievance is that while as a matter of fact the employees of the canteen are the employees of the D.V.C. for all practical purposes, they are however not being given the benefit of any pay scale or adequate pay as enjoyed by the other employees of the D.V.C. more particularly those of the staff who are employed in the Inspection Bungalows and Directors’ Bungalows of the D.V.C. and who perform duties of same nature there as performed by the canteen employees. On the other hand it is the contention of the respondent D.V.C. that the canteen is run, managed and controlled by the Co-operative society under the provisions, of its bye laws and the D.V.C. authorities have got no concern with the management, employment or control over the canteen or its employees except granting certain financial subsidy to the Co- operative society for running the canteen.
2, A glance at the details of staff of the canteen, annexure-A to the writ petition, will show that some of the employees of the canteen are working there ever since 1966, 1967, 1968, and 1969. It is thus evident, that the canteen is in existence for at least about 30 years last. It is also evident that the canteen caters to the need of the employees of the D.V.C. who work there. There cannot be any denying of the fact that such canteen exists for the purpose of affording necessary food facilities to the employees working in the office. The necessity or the benefit of the existence of canteen service for the employees at the place of work needs no emphasis. The Factories Act contains provisions for maintaining statutory canteens in factories. The canteen maintained in the office of the D.V.C. is however, a non-statutory canteen but even then it has close nexus with the functioning of the office inasmuch as it affords opportunity to the employees to meet their vital need of getting ready supply of food on payment basis while they attend office without requiring them to go to distant places in search of food.
3. In the affidavit-in-reply it is stated by the writ petitioners that the infrastructure for running the canteen viz. premises, furniture, electricity, water are supplied by the respondent Corporation (i.e., D.V.C.) and the entire cost of the functioning of the canteen establishment and other miscellaneous expenses are determined and fixed and also borne by the respondent Corporation in the form of grants to D.V.C. Employees Co-operatives Stores and Canteens Limited. From annexure-E to the writ petition it will appear that the D.V.C. grant fund for running the canteen including payment of salary to the employees of the canteen and expenses under different other heads. Annexure-A to the affidavit in reply is also an order issued by the appropriate authority of D.V.C. by which the D.V.C. grant monthly amount for meeting the establishment cost of the canteen towards payment of wages to the workers and other miscellaneous expenses. Annexure- A to the affidavit-in-reply also includes a sanction order dated June 24, 1994 issued for modernisation of the canteen whereby an amount of Rs. 2,78,000/-was sanctioned by the D.V.C. for procurement of crockereies, utensils etc., trolley, hot box, refrigerator, deep fridge, furniture etc., for use in the D.V.C. canteen, Rs. 16,000/- for procurement and supply of liveries to the canteen workers and Rs. 1,06,000/- towards installation charges of pipe line gas connection. By order dated April 25, 1995 annexed to the affidavit-in-
reply the D.V.C. authorities enhanced the amount of monthly grant payable to the D.V.C. Employees Co- operative Stores and Canteens Ltd. for meeting the establishment cost towards payment of wages to the workers of the canteen in view of the revision of the minimum rates of daily wages by the Government of West Bengal. All these documents indeed go to show that the D.V.C. has been undertaking the entire financial responsibility not only for running the canteen and for meeting the expenses towards the wages of the employees of the canteen but also for modernisation of the canteen. The monthly grant of the D.V.C. includes not only the wages of the canteen employees but also bonus, house rent allowance, ad-hoc allowance, safety allowance, tiffin allowance, medical allowance, and washing allowance per month for each of the canteen employees. The elaborate pattern of the grant for each employee under the different heads leaves no doubt that the D.V.C. has been playing the role of employer in respect of the canteen employees. In paragraph 7 of the affidavit-in-re-ply it is inter alia stated that the D.V.C. provides statutory canteens in Thermal Power Stations at Bokaro, Durgapur, and Chandrapura through contractors and that, in the Head Office also the D.V.C. provides canteen services since long back to its employees as a measure of non-statutory obligation and that the canteen in the Head Office of the Corporation has become a part of service conditions of the employees and the provision of canteen is a part of total corporation establishments. Evidently so far as the statutory canteens are concerned the D.V.C. has an obligation to maintain the same which they are doing through contractors. Annexure G to the writ petition is an extract of certain office order of the Government of India dated November 24, 1986 fixing the revised pay and allowances for non-statutory canteen employees on the basis of the 4th Pay Commission recommendations wherein it is inter alia stated that in pursuance of the interim orders of the Supreme Court of India to pay the non-statutory canteen employees the same rate and at the same basis on which the employees of the statutory canteens are being paid, the pay scales of the non- statutory canteen employees were revised as mentioned therein.
4. The learned Advocate for the petitioners relies upon the decision of the Supreme Court in the (1) Saraspur Mills Co. Ltd. v. Ramanlal Chi-manlal and Ors., (1973-II-LLJ-130) where it was held that when there is a statutory obligation on the appellant company to run a canteen in the factory then even though the canteen was run by a Co-operative society the employees working in the canteen would be covered by the definition of the word ’employed’ as contained in Section 3(13) of the Bombay Industrial Relations Act. This decision has been cited for the purpose of substantiating the proposition that even though the Co-operative society might have been formed for running the canteen yet the real employer may be the Corporation itself managing the canteen through the agency of the Co-operative society. The other decision relied upon by the learned Advocate for the petitioners is the recent decision of the Supreme Court in Parimal Chandra Raha v. Life Insurance Corporation of India and Ors., (1995-II-LLJ- 339). In that case the appellants/workmen were working in canteens at different offices of the respondent Life Insurance Corporation of India in Calcutta. The questions that arose in the appeal were whether the appellants were or should be deemed to be regular employees of the respondent-Corporation and if yes, what pay scales and other service conditions they were entitled to. The appellants claimed parity in wages with other regular employees of the Corporation. From the facts of record it appeared that the canteen services had been provided to the employees of the Corporation for a long time and that it was the Corporation which had been from time to time taking steps to provide the said services. The Canteen Committees, the Co-operative society of the employees and the contractors entrusted to run and manage the canteens had only been acting for and on behalf of the Corporation as its agencies to provide the said services. In the facts and circumstances it was held in that case that the canteens of the respondent Corporation had become a part of the establishment of the Corporation and the canteen committees, the Co-operative society of the employees and the contractors engaged from time to time were in reality the agencies of the Corporation and were, only a veil between the Corporation and the canteen workers. It is clear from the said decision of the Supreme Court (vide paragraph 25 ibid) that the law as now settled is that the canteen maintained under the obligatory provisions of the Factories Act for the use of the employees becomes a part of the establishment and the workers employed in such canteen are employees of the management, and that even if there is a non-statutory obligation to provide a canteen (as distinct from obligation to provide facilities to run canteen) the position is the same as in the case of statutory canteens and further that the obligation to provide canteen may be explicit or implicit and whether the provision for canteen services has become a part of the service conditions of the employees or not is a question to be determined on the facts and circumstances of each case. As we have seen in our present case also, the canteen is being run for a very long time, for nearly 30 years or more. The infrastructure for running the canteen, such as, the premises, furniture, electricity, water are supplied by the D.V.C. as stated in paragraph 7 of the affidavit-in-reply. The entire financial burden is also borne by the D.V.C. steps for modernisation of the canteen at huge expenses are also taken by the D.V.C. In the facts and circumstances obtaining in this case, it can be visualised that the existence of the Co-operative society for running the canteen is nothing but the existence of an intermediary agency of the Corporation and the Corporation for all effective purpose controls the running of the canteen which has become a part of the office establishment of the D.V.C. as an obligation to provide canteen for the benefit of its employees working there for whom it has virtually become a part of their service conditions.
5. The learned Advocate for the respondent D.V.C. however referred to the decision of the Supreme Court in Surendra Prasad Khugsal v. Chairman, M.M.T. Corporation of India, (1994-I-LLJ-351). There the writ petition was filed by the workers employed in non- statutory recognised canteens claiming same status as that of Central Government employees with all benefits and pay scales. Since disputed facts were involved in the case which could not be resolved in a writ petition, the Supreme Court directed the matter to be referred to the Industrial Tribunal. The learned Advocate of the D.V.C. also referred to another decision for the Supreme Court in Board of Trustees, Port of Calcutta v. Achintya Kumar (1993-II-LLJ-640) where also the question was involved as to whether the employees of the non-statutory canteens in Port Trust recruited by contractors were the employees of Port Trust. Since all the relevant materials were not brought on the records of the case, the Supreme Court in appeal gave an opportunity to the parties to produce all relevant documents and materials in support of the respective contentions before the trial Court. It may be noticed that in both the cases the Supreme Court did not take any final decision on the question involved because of lack of proper factual materials
6. Since in our present case there are adequate factual materials, as discussed earlier, from which it is possible to hold that although the canteen in question is not a statutory canteen, yet the D.V.C. has accepted it as its non-statutory obligation to provide for canteen services to its employees through the canteen in question as a part of its establishment for the benefit of its employees for whom it has virtually become a part of their service conditions. That being, so the recent decision of the Supreme Court in Parimal Chandra Raha v. Life Insurance Corporation of India (supra) is applicable to our present case and accordingly relying on the said decision I hold that the employees of the canteen in question are required to be treated as the employees of D.V.C. and they should be given the benefit of proper pay scales and other benefits like retiral benefits, provident fund, etc., as are admissible to the employees of D.V.C. As regards pay scales, since the Government of India have directed that the employees of non-statutory canteens shall also be paid at the same rate and on the same basis as the employees of statutory canteens, it is considered fit and proper that the D.V.C. shall give similar benefits to the employees of the concerned canteen as has been provided by the Government of India for the employees of non-Statutory canteens. The respondents D.V.C. and its authorities are directed to give such benefits to the employees of concerned canteen within twelve weeks from this date after normally absorbing them in the D.V.C.’s regular establishment, but with effect from this day.
No cost is ordered. The writ petition stands disposed of accordingly.