The definition of "wages" in the Payment of Wages Act includes an award made by the Industrial Court directing the employer to pay additional wages or additional dearness allowance.

JUDGMENT :

MAHOMMEDALI CURRIM CHAGLA, J.

The Industrial Court made an award on 21 July 1949 fixing the standard of wages of the employees of the Prabha Mills and also fixing their dearness allowance. Both the wages and the dearness allowance which were being paid by the mills to their employees were increased by this award. The Court also directed that these payments should be made from November 1947 and should be made by August 1949. As the mills failed to make these payments, an application was made to the authority under the Payment of Wages Act for an order directing the mills to make the payment, and the order for payment was made by the Additional Resident First Class Magistrate, Viramgam, who is the authority. An appeal was preferred from this order to the Second Assistant Judge, Ahmedabad, and the learned Assistant Judge in a very careful and able judgment reviewing all the authorities came to the conclusion that the mills were liable to pay under the Payment of Wages Act and confirmed the order of the learned Magistrate. It is these orders which are being challenged by this petition, and the contention of Mr. Thakor on behalf of the petitioners is that neither the authority under the Payment of Wages Act nor the learned Assistant Judge had jurisdiction’ to make the order as what was awarded by the Industrial Court did not constitute “wages” within the meaning of the Payment of Wages Act.

1. The short question therefore that falls for determination is whether the definition of “wages” given in the Payment of Wages Act is sufficiently wide to cover an award made by the Industrial Court directing the employer to pay additional wages or additional dearness allowance. “Wages” has been defined in Sec. 2(6) and it means all remuneration, capable of being expressed in terms of money, which would, if the terms of the contract of employment, express or implied, were fulfilled, he payable (and I am omitting the words which are not necessary) and includes any bonus or other additional remuneration of the nature aforesaid which would he so payable and any sum payable to such person by reason of the termination of his employment, and then the definition sets out various payments which are not to be included in the definition of “wages.” Therefore it will be noticed that “wages” postulate three conditions. They must be a payment which can be expressed in terms of money; they must be payable by the employer to the employee, in other words, the payment must be due by the employer while the relationship of employer and employee subsists; and they must be payable on the fulfilment of the contract of employment entered into between the employer and employee. The submission made by Mr. Thakor is that what is payable by the employer under an award of the Industrial Court does not constitute a term, express or implied, of the contract that there would be an industrial dispute which would be referred to the industrial tribunal and that an award might be made which might compel the employer to pay certain amounts to the employee, and therefore Mr. Thakor urges that what the award directed to be paid by the employer cannot be “wages” as that payment was not imposed upon the employer by the terms of the contract. Clearly, the fallacy underlying this argument is that “wages” only refer to those payments which are made obligatory upon the employer by the terms of the contract. If that were the intention of the legislature, the legislature would have defined wages as remuneration capable of being expressed in terms of money payable under the terms of the contract. But that is not the language used by the legislature. The legislature has advisedly used the words

“if the terms of the contract of employment, express or implied were fulfilled.”

2. Therefore the emphasis laid by the legislature is not upon “the terms of the contract,” but upon what liability is imposed upon the employer to pay his employee when the contract has been fulfilled. Therefore, wh