Judgment

KRISHNA IYER, J.:- This appeal has been set down for hearing on more than one occasion and has taken us considerable time not because the facts are complicated, nor because principles governing the decision are novel, but because attempts were made after some discussion in Court, to see if differences could be ironed out and smooth relations established between the employer and the workmen. While we have been benefited by charts and statistics, we have not been able to arrive at an agreed solution to the problem.

2. The question basically turns on to the increase in the Dearness Allowance demanded by the workmen and eventually granted by the Industrial Court in its award. We are concerned with a solitary Textile Mill in Poona. Although there are no other Textile Mills in Poona yet there are a few Textile Mills in Sholapur with which the Poona Dearness Allowance rates have been linked up historically, not necessarily rationally. Further away, we have Bombay, which has round about 65 Textile Mills. Unfortunately, the cost of living index was available for Sholapur and Bombay but not for Poona until 1965, so much so that Dearness Allowance for workmen of Poona Textile Mills was always linked to the Consumer Price Index of Sholapur, which, in one sense, is artificial but in another historical. Sholapur has had its fluctuating fortunes in respect of textile mills but Poona has had an undisturbed course in regard to the economics of the mill in question, A time has come as substantially agreed to by the counsel on both sides. when Poona Index, in a sense must realistically govern the Dearness Allowance for the workmen in Poona especially in the industry with which we are concerned here. We have looked at the problem in the light of the various reasons given by the Court and in the further light of comments and criticisms offered by both sides. May be there may be some force in the criticism made by the management here and there. There is something to be said in favour of the attitude of the Court having regard to the submissions made by the workmens counsel. Perfection of logic is beyond law much more so in the field of Industrial Jurisprudence. Impeccable approaches and meticulous mathematics are alien to this branch of law. We are concerned with the pragmatics of law geared to social justice liberated from legalistics.

3. However, certain basics are clear and indeed fundamental. The constitutional principles of Part IV expressed in Articles 38, 39 and 39A and values enshrined in the Preamble inform and enliven this department of jurisprudence. Flexibility, not rigidity, broader considerations, not fanatical adherence, govern this jurisdiction. Of course, the parameters of industrial law have been made clear for decades by this Court and those guidelines have been, time and again, referred to and reinforced. We are not called upon to launch on a fresh discussion of the first principles. What is called for is application of those principles, not, with finical nicety but with flexible viability. From one angle it may appear that any decision regarding Dearness Allowance has a touch of arbitrariness or a colour of caprice; from another it may appear unrealistic or unworkable. These are the unavoidable features of this branch of law where actually decisions have to be reached by the application of well tried principles to the concrete figures presenting themselves.

4. Ultimately, humanism projects itself more than any other. This Court has pointed out that where we deal with the lowest brackets of wages, neutralisation on account of inflationary spirals must be hundred per cent because the right to life with bare necessaries cannot be shrunken still further. The higher ranges admit of or accommodate lesser percentage in the matter of neutralisation.

5. We have heard counsel at some length. We have had figures offered to us from both sides. We have experimented with possibilities of results with one formula or other adopted. We have