JUDGMENT :

Sarkar, J.

1. The appellant is a manufacturer of chemicals including soda ash. For the purpose of its manufacture the appellant requires common salt. It produces the salt so required in a salt work run by it at a place called Kuda in which a large number of persons is employed. In or about 1951, certain disputes arose between the appellant and the persons employed by it in its salt work. On 5-11-1951, the Government of the former State of Saurashtra where Kuda was situated, referred these disputes under Section 10 of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 to an Industrial Tribunal for adjudication. This appeal arises out of the award made by the Tribunal on that reference.

2. It will be useful at this stage briefly to describe the process of the manufacture of salt which is as follows: certain wells twenty to thirty feet deep and nine feet in diameter are dug in a land which the appellant has taken on lease and on which the salt work is situated. Brine collects in the wells by percolation, the land being salty, and is drawn out and stored in a sump. From the sump the brine is taken by a channel into another reservoir called the condenser. Here the brine is kept for sometime to