Judgment

BHAGWATI, J. :- The petitioner is the Director of a social action group called Social Work and Research Centre operating in and around Tilonia village in Ajmer district of the State of Rajasthan. The Social Work and Research Centre is a duty registered society and since February 1972, it has been actively engaged in the work of upliftment of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in different areas and particularly in and around Tilonia village. It operates through various groups and the present writ petition has been filed by the petitioner for the purpose of remedying gross violations of the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 which have been discovered by one such group. These violations according to the petitioner, have been taking place in the following circumstances and they need to be redressed through judicial intervention. The Public Works Department of the State of Rajasthan is construing Madanganj Harmara Road close to village Tilonia and according to the State Government, it is part of famine relief work undertaken with a view to providing relief to persons affected by drought and scarcity conditions. The State Government in the Public Works Department has engaged a large number of workers for construction of this road and they include women belonging to Scheduled Castes. It is common ground that the minimum wages for a construction worker in Rajasthan is Rs. 7/- per day and it was asserted on behalf of the petitioner and not disputed on behalf of the State Government that the Notification fixing the minimum wages of Rs. 7/- per day does not specify any particular quantity of work to be turned out by the worker in order to be entitled to this minimum wage. Now the practice followed by the Public Works Department for engaging workers for the construction work is to issue an identity card to every resident in the famine affected area who registers himself with the Halka Patwari and the identity card would show the number of members in the family of the card-holder including males, females and children. Every resident in the famine affected area would be entitled to be employed in the famine relief work undertaken by the State Government on production of the identity card. This way a large number of workers including women belonging to Scheduled Castes are engaged in the construction work of the Madanganj-Harmara Road. The workers employed in this construction work are divided into gangs of 20 persons or multiple thereof and there is a separate muster roll for each such gang and the work done by it is measured every fortnight and payment is made by the Public Works Department to the mate who is the leader of the gang according to the work turned out by such gang during such fortnight. The Public Works Department has fixed a certain norm of work to be turned out by each gang before the workmen belonging to such gang can claim the minimum wage of Rs. 7/- per day with the result that if any particular gang turns out work according to the norm fixed by the Public Works Department the mate would be paid such amount as would on distribution give a wage of Rs. 7/- per day to the workmen constituting such gang, but if less work is turned out by such gang, payment to be made to the mate of such gang would be proportionately reduced and in that event, the wage earned by each member of such gang would fall short of the minimum of Rs. 7/- per day. The petitioner has stated in the writ petition that as a consequence of this practice followed by the Public Works Department workmen belonging to most of the gangs receive a wage very much less than the minimum wage of Rs. 7/- per day as illustrated by a few instances set out in Annexure I to the writ petition. The petitioner has also averred that even within the gang itself, differential payments are made to the workmen without any visible principle or norm and it is not uncommon that a worker who has put in full days work throughout the period of the fortnight, may get less than the minim