R.K.Choudhary, J.

1. This is an application under Article 227 of the Constitution of India. The petitioner in this case is the Harinagar Sugar Mills Ltd., a public limited company registered under the Indian Companies Act, having its registered office at Bombay, and owning a vacuum pan sugar factory at Harinagar, where it carries on business of manufacture of sugar from crushing of sugarcane. During the crushing season, which normally starts from November and lasts till April each year, the work is carried on in three shifts, namely A, B and G.

The last shift, namely, shift C, begins from 12 midnight and continues up to 8 a.m. On the 10th of March, 1958, respondent No. 2, Shri Lalit Lal, who was a Mill Engine driver, and one Ratan Gaddi, who was a Mill Engine Oil-man, were working in the C shift. Respondent No. 2 was working on Mill Engine No. 1. The big and bearing of the engine in question got heated as oil did not reach it from the oil reservoir, with the result that it melted away at about 5 a.m., on that date causing stoppage of that engine and consequently stoppage of the crushing of sugar cane in the factory for about 13 hours, as a result of which the entire process