A Constitution bench of the Supreme Court has reserved its verdict on the contentious issue of definition of the word 'industry' under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947. A nine-member Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice (CJI) Surya Kant, during the three-day hearing, heard Attorney General R Venkataramani, Additional Solicitor General K. Heard arguments from various lawyers including M. Nataraj and other senior advocates like Shekhar Naphade, Indira Jaising, CU Singh and Sanjay Hegde.
Apart from the Chief Justice, this bench also includes Justice BV Nagarathna, Justice PS Narasimha, Justice Dipankar Dutta, Justice Ujjwal Bhuyan, Justice Satish Chandra Sharma, Justice Joymalya Bagchi, Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice Vipul M. Pancholi.
The bench said it would examine the legal validity of a 1978 judgment by a seven-member bench that gave a broad interpretation of the word 'industry' to regulate labor relations. A seven-judge bench, while ruling on a petition by the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Treatment Board on February 21, 1978, expanded the definition of the word industry, bringing lakhs of workers employed in hospitals, educational institutions, clubs and government welfare departments within the ambit of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.
On February 16, the Supreme Court had set out broad issues for the consideration of the Constitution Bench. The bench had said, whether the test laid down in paragraphs 140 to 144 of the opinion delivered by Justice VR Krishna Iyer in the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewage Treatment Board case (1978) is the correct law to determine whether an undertaking or enterprise falls within the definition of 'industry'?
The bench had said that one of the issues to be considered by the nine-member bench would be whether social welfare activities and schemes or other enterprises undertaken by government departments or their institutions can be considered as industrial activities for the purpose of Section 2(j) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.
