ORDER :

S.M. Subramaniam, J.

1. In respect of special allowance paid by the management, the issue was raised whether such special allowances are to be included along with the basic wages for the purpose of calculating the contributions to be paid under Employee's Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1952. The Hon'ble Supreme Court of India decided the issue in the case of Regional Provident Fund Commissioner (II) West Bengal Vs. Vivekananda Vidyamandir and Others, stating that the special allowances also form part and parcel of basic wages and to be taken in to account for the purpose of calculating the contributions. The relevant paragraphs 12, 13 and 14 of the judgment are extracted hereunder:-

"12. The term basic wage has not been defined under the Act. Adverting to the dictionary meaning of the same in Kichha Sugar Company Limited through General Manager v. Tarai Chini Mill Majdoor Union, Uttarakhand, (2014) 4 SCC 37, it was observed as follows:

"9. According to http://www.merriam-webster.com (Merriam Webster Dictionary) the word 'basic wage' means as follows:

1. A wage or salary based on the cost of living and used as a standard for calculating rates of pay

2. A rate of pay for a standard work period exclusive of such additional payments as bonuses and overtime.

10. When an expression is not defined, one can take into account the definition given to such expression in a statute as also the dictionary meaning. In our opinion, those wages which are universally, necessarily and ordinarily paid to all the employees across the board are basic wage. Where the payment is available to those who avail the opportunity more than others, the amount paid for that cannot be included in the basic wage. As for example, the overtime allowance, though it is generally enforced across the board but not earned by all employees equally. Overtime wages or for that matter, leave encashment may be available to each workman but it may vary from one workman to other. The extra bonus depends upon the extra hour of work done by the workman whereas leave encashment shall depend upon the number of days of leave available to workman. Both are variable. In view of what we have observed above, we are of the opinion that the amount received as leave encashment and overtime wages is not fit to be included for calculating 15% of the Hill Development Allowance."

13. That the Act was a piece of beneficial social welfare legislation and must be interpreted as such was considered in The Daily Partap v. The Regional Provident Fund Commissioner, Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Union Territory, Chandigarh, (1998) 8 SCC 90.

14. Applying the aforesaid tests to the facts of the present appeals, no material has been placed by the establishments to demonstrate that the allowances in question being paid to its employees were either variable or were linked to any incentive for production resulting in greater output by an employee and that the allowances in question were not paid across the board to all employees in a particular category or were being paid especially to those who avail the opportunity. In order that the amount goes beyond the basic wages, it has to be shown that the workman concerned had become eligible to get this extra amount beyond the normal work which he was otherwise required to put in. There is no data available on record to show what were the norms of work prescribed for those workmen during the relevant period. It is therefore not possible to ascertain whether extra amounts paid to the workmen were in fact paid for the extra work which had exceeded the normal output prescribed for the workmen. The wage structure and the components of salary have been examined on facts, both by the authority and the appellate authority under the Act, who have arrived at a factual conclusion that the allowances in question were essentially a part of the basic wage camouflaged as part of an allowance so as to avoid deduction and contribution accordingly to t