1. This petition challenges a decision of the Chief Judge of the Small Cause Court, Bombay, by which he held that the Authority under the Payment of Wages Act had no jurisdiction to entertain the application made by the petitioner and 116 other against the Naval Dockyard for payment of part of their wages illegally deducted. The facts briefly are that these 117 persons were employed as lorry drivers in the Indian Naval Dockyard end from May 1945 to July 1947 their wages were Rs. 100/-per month.

In August 1947 their wages were reduced from Rs. 100/- to Rs. 70/-. On 31-12-1947 rules were framed by the Governor General under Section 241(2), Government of India Act and these rules were issued in a notification and under this the wage scale for the lorry drivers was fixed at Rs. 60-75. It appears that these lorry drivers were asked to elect as to whether they would accept this wage scale and also if they did accept, the wage scale was to operate from 1-1-1947. They elected to accept this wage scale.

As a result of the election they were given the top of the grade viz. Rs. 75/- and Rs. 25/- were given to them as personal pay. The result was that their Wages were brought up to the w