Basant, J.

(i) Is Entry No.13 of the Schedule of the Kerala Head Load workers Act, 1978 (for short 'the Act') valid, legal and constitutional? Is there objectionable transgression by the State legislature into the legislative province earmarked exclusively for the Parliament under Entry Nos.5 and 53 of List 1 of Schedule 7 of the Constitution?

(ii) Are the trained employees (distribution boys) of the petitioners performing the work of loading and unloading of LPG cylinders in the godowns of the petitioners only as incidental and ancillary to their work as distribution boys? Can they be held to be workers answering the definition of 'headload worker' under Sec.2(m) of the Act?

(iii) Are the headload workers represented by the respondents/unions entitled to demand such work of loading and unloading of LPG cylinders in the godowns of the petitioners?

(iv) Are directions liable to be issued under Art.226 of the Constitution obliging the respondents/police officials to afford police protection to the petitioners to get the loading and unloading work of LPG cylinders in their godowns done by employing their distribution boys who have admittedly not registered themselves as loading and unloading workers under the Act?

These questions arise for consideration in these writ petitions which have been taken up for hearing and disposal together as requested by all concerned.

2. On fundamental facts there is little dispute. The petitioners are licensed dealers under the Indian Oil Corporation. They deal in LPG cylinders. They are duly licensed to carry on such business as dealers in accordance with law. According to them, their work, as such dealers, includes the receipt of filled up LPG cylinders at their godowns. Such LPG cylinders are brought in trucks. They have to be unloaded and stacked in their godowns. Thereafter the filled up LPG cylinders are sent to the consumers through distribution boys. The empty gas cylinders are carried back from the customers to the godowns by distribution boys. They stack the empty LPG cylinders in the godowns. When trucks come these stackedempty LPG cylinders are to be loaded into the trucks. This, in short, is the activity of the petitioners.

3.According to the petitioners, the work of unloading filled up LPG cylinders from the trucks and stacking them at the godowns of the petitioners as also the work of loading empty gas cylinders into the trucks is purely ancillary and incidental to the work of the distribution boys and they are undertaking such work. The distribution boys are trained for such work. They cannot be reckoned as headload workers defined under the Act -their work of unloading/loading filled up/ empty LPG cylinders from/to the trucks being purely ancillary and incidental to their work of delivery of gas cylinders to the consumers and bringing back empty cylinders from the consumers. There is no dispute about the work of the distribution boys carrying filled up gas cylinders from the godowns to the consumers and bringing the empty cylinders back to the godown from the consumers. There is no dispute or claim for the respondents/unions regarding that item of work.

4. The dispute is about the work of unloading and stacking filled up gas cylinders from the trucks which carry them to the godowns of the petitioners and loading empty gas cylinders stacked in the godown into the trucks which carry them away. Are the petitioners entitled to get such work done through trained distribution boys employed by them? Are the other headload workers of the locality represented by the respondents/unions entitled to claim such work? This is the crucial dispute that has arisen. The respondents/unions representing headload workers are claiming such work. They are obstructing the distribution boys of the petitioners. Police protection may be afforded to the petitioners to get such work done by their distribution workers without any obstruction from the respondents/unions, it is prayed.

5. There i