The central legal point established in the judgment is the determination of the applicability of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970 to the petitioners' business operations, and the finding that the complaints were barred by limitation.

ORDER :

1. These are Criminal Miscellaneous Cases filed under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, seeking to quash S.T. Nos. 20 of 2019 and 14 of 2019 respectively, pending before the Judicial First Class Magistrate’s Court, Kunnamangalam. Since parties are same and contentions are common, both these matters were heard together and are disposed of by this common order.

2. In S.T. No. 20 of 2019 subject matter is a complaint preferred by the 2nd respondent alleging offence under Section 24 of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970, hereinafter referred to as the Act, where the following allegations are raised against the petitioners who are the Director and the General Manager respectively of Sarovar Hotel Pvt. Ltd. which is employed in hospitality industry:

(i) Register of persons employed has not been maintained and not kept at the site office or at any other place within a radius of 3 kms from the workplace in breach of Rule 75 of the Central Rules.

(ii) Muster Roll in Form-XVI, Register of Wages in Form-XVII, Register of deduction for damage and loss in Form-XX, Register of fine in Form-XXI, Register of Advance in Form-XXII, Register of Overtime in Form-XXIII have not been maintained in breach of Rule 78 of the Central Rules.

(iii) An abstract of the Act and Rules in the form approved by the Chief Labour Commissioner (Central), New Delhi has not been displayed at the work site in English, Hindi and in the language spoken by the majority of workers in breach of Rule 79 of the Central Rules.

(iv) Notice showing rate of wages, hours of work, date of payment of wages, wage period, name and address of the Inspectors having jurisdiction and date of payment of unpaid wages have not been displayed at the work site in English, Hindi and in the local language understood by the majority of workers in breach of Rule 81(1)(i) of the Central Rules.

(v) Copy each of the notices to be displayed have not been sent to the Inspector in breach of Rule 81(2) of the Central Rules.

3. Similarly, there are two counts of offences alleged in S.T. No. 14 of 2019, which is the subject matter of Crl. M.C. No. 2794 of 2019 where the offence alleged are under Section 23 of the Act. Those two counts are as shown below:

(i) Petitioners executed contract work through contract labour numbering more than 20 with effect from 01.12.2013 without obtaining licence in breach of Section 12(1) of the Act.

(ii) Intimation about the commencement/completion of the contract work has not been submitted to the Inspector in Form-VIA and thus the petitioners breached Rule 25(2)(viii) of the Central Rules.

4. According to the petitioners, the 1st petitioner was the successful bidder in an e-tender floated by the Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode, hereinafter referred to as the IIM, inviting suitable vendor for rendering hospitality services such as restaurant and pantry services, housekeeping services, front office services, security services, laundry services, etc. at its management development centre. After obtaining bid in favour of the petitioners, on 03.12.2013 a detailed terms of agreement was executed between the management of the IIM and the petitioner company for a period of three years which was later extended under Annexure 2 and 2(a) documents produced by the petitioners. The said agreement was for providing “hospitality services, such as restaurant and pantry services, housekeeping services, 24 hours front office services, 24 hours security services, 24 hours laundry services and other miscellaneous tasks.” According to the petitioners the said agreement does not provide contract labour but for providing services only. Moreover, the rates agreed therein were monthly lump sum amount for provision of services rather than per workman cost. According to the petitioners, they had been carrying out the services through its own employees including workmen, supervisory and managerial staff who are working on full-time basis under fixed term con