Judgment

DAS GUPTA, J. : The only point raised in this appeal by the employer, Petlad Turkey Red Dye Works Limited, Petlad, against the award of an Industrial Tribunal of a sum Rs. 9,839 equivalent to one month s basic wages is as regards the correctness of the disallowance, in the process of ascertaining the available surplus, of a claim of 4 per cent interest on Rs. 2,27,000 standing and the deprecation fund said to have been used as working capital. If this claim was allowed and the amount claimed deducted as a prior charge no surplus would remain so that the employees would not be entitled to any bonus. The Industrial Tribunal was of opinion that even if the depreciation reserve was utilised as working capital no return thereon was allowable for the purposes of deciding on the amount to be deducted as prior charges in applying the Full Bench Formal. In this view it was clearly wrong. Numerous decisions of this Court make it abundantly clear that any portion of the reserve actually utilized as working capital in the year under consideration should be treated as entitled to a reasonable rate of return and the amount thus ascertained deducted as a prior charge in ascertaining the a