Malis employed in bungalow gardens of officers are not entitled to bonus under the Coal Mines Bonus Scheme, 1948, as they are employed on domestic and personal work within the meaning of the exception in para 3 of the Scheme.

JUDGMENT :

Sarkar, J.

1. The appellants, the Bhowra Kankanee Coal Co. Ltd., own the Bhowra and other collieries. On the Bhowra Colliery there are a number of residential bungalows belonging to the appellants occupied by their officers employed in the colliery. The appellants employ certain malis for working as such in these bungalows and their duty is to look after and maintain the gardens there. A dispute arose between the appellants and their workmen as to whether these malis, who were fourteen in number, were entitled to bonus. By an order made on June 23, 1959, under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, the Government of India referred this dispute along with another with which we are not concerned in this case, for adjudication to the Industrial Tribunal, Dhanbad. The points referred concerning the dispute above mentioned were in these terms:

(1) Whether the withdrawal of the benefit of bonus provided in the Coal Mines Bonus Scheme by the management of the Bhowra Colliery from the following garden mazdoors/malis is justified. If not, to what relief are they entitled and from what date?

(2) Whether the garden mazdoors/malis referred to above are employed on domestic and personal work within the meaning of para 3(b) of the Coal Mines Bonus Scheme, 1948 and if not, to what relief are they entitled and from what date?

The points so referred were decided by the Tribunal against the appellants by an award made on December 7, 1959 and the present appeal is against that award.

2. Till January 1, 1955, the Bhowra and certain other collieries managed as a group, were owned by the Eastern Coal Company Ltd., and on that date these collieries were sold to the appellants. At the time when this sale was being arranged, the workmen in these collieries raised a dispute that their services should be treated as continuous in spite of the transfer of the collieries from one owner to another by the sale and that the conditions of their service and the facilities which they were enjoying under the previous owners should be guaranteed and continued by the succeeding owners, that is the appellants, after the latter took over the collieries. At the instance of the conciliation officer appointed under the Act this dispute was settled by an agreement made on January 14, 1955 to which the conciliation officer, the workmen, the previous owners and the appellants were parties. Para 3 of this agreement provided as follows:

"Agreed that the existing service conditions and the facilities will be continued, excepting pension".

3. Now in 1948 an Act called the Coal Mines Provident Fund and Bonus Schemes Act had been passed by Section 5 by which the Central Government was empowered to frame a bonus scheme for the payment of bonus to the employees of coal mines. The Central Government had framed a Bonus Scheme under this provision in 1948 and since then the previous owners had been paying the malis employed for the bungalow gardens belonging to the Bhowra Colliery, bonus in terms of it. In 1951 they once stopped the bonus but that caused an industrial dispute and they thereupon restored the bonus. Up to the acquisition of the Bhowra Colliery by the appellants the position thus was that these malis had been receiving bonus since 1948 excepting for a short period during which it had been stopped as earlier mentioned. After they became the owners of the Bhowra Colliery, the appellants however stopped the payment of bonus to these malis. This raised the industrial dispute which had led to this appeal.

4. Para 3 of the Bonus Scheme framed under the Act, so far as relevant for this case, is in these terms:

'3. Except as hereinafter provided every employee in a coal mine to which this Scheme applies shall be eligible to qualify for a bonus.

Exceptions.- An employee in coal mine shall not be entitled to a bonus under the Scheme for the period during which

(a) * * *

(b) he is employed as a mali, sweeper or domestic servant on domestic and personal work;

(c) * * *"

One of the questi