New Law College

Name of the Student: Mahesh Bhambu Kutekar

Roll No: 227

Class and Division: F Y LLB / C

Subject: Labour Laws

Topic of Assignment: "Award" Under The Industrial Disputes Act, 1947

Sir/Ma’am,

I have taken the above-mentioned topic for my F.Y.LLB Semester I

assignment.
INTRODUCTION

The Industrial revolution was done by Britishers in India during colonial period.
They came to India with the objective of doing trade, and later on they formed first company in
India that is well known in the history of India as East India Company, this company was formed
according to the company laws then existed in England. From there the industrial revolution
started in India and today we can see India has achieved significant growth in Industrial
development, it contributes a good portion in our domestic GDP every year along with
employment to people of India in huge number.

As the industrial development began in India, disputes in Industry and workmen

started to happen and there was no formal legal setup to deal with these type of problems
between and industry and workers. The first enactment dealing with the settlement of industrial
disputes was the Employers’ and Workmen’s Disputes Act, 1860. This Act weighed much
against the workers and was therefore replaced by the Trade Disputes Act, 1929.

The Act of 1929 contained special provisions regarding strikes in public utility
services and general strikes affecting the community as a whole. The main purpose of the Act,
however, was to provide a conciliation machinery to bring about peaceful settlement of industrial
disputes. The Whitely Commission made in this regard the perceptive observation that the
attempt to deal with unrest must begin rather with the creation of an atmosphere unfavorable to
disputes than with machinery for their settlement.

The next stage in the development of industrial law in this country was taken under
the stress of emergency caused by the Second World War. Rule 81-A of the Defence of India
Rules was intended to provide speedy remedies for industrial disputes by referring them
compulsorily to conciliation or adjudication, by making the awards legally binding on the parties
and by prohibiting strikes or lock-outs during the pendency of conciliation or adjudication
proceedings and for two months thereafter. This rule also put a blanket ban on strikes which did
not arise out of genuine trade disputes.

OBJECT AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ACT

The Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 makes provision for the investigation and settlement
of industrial disputes and for certain other purposes. It ensures progress of industry by bringing
about harmony and cordial relationship between the employers and employees. Definitions of the
words ‘industrial dispute, workmen and industry’ carry specific meanings under the Act and
provide the framework for the application of the Act.
 The act extends to whole of India. The act was designed to provide a machinery to deal with the
disputes between workmen and industry. The objective is to bring interpretative process to
reduce the conflicts and expand the area of agreement and show its preference for upholding
agreements by mutuality and in large public interest.

AWARD under Industrial Disputes Act, 1947: [SECTION 2(b)]

“Award” means an interim or a final determination of any industrial dispute

or of any question relating thereto by any Labour Court, Industrial Tribunal
or National Industrial Tribunal and includes an arbitration award made
under Section 10-A.

An Award must be
i) Interim or final determination
ii) Of an industrial dispute or any question relating thereto and
iii) By any
a) Labour court
b) Industrial tribunal
c) National tribunal or
d) An arbitrator under section 10A

The object of the decision in the ‘award’ is to resolve the differences

between the disputants. The expression ‘determination of any dispute’ means an
adjudication of the dispute between the parties. The definition of an ‘award’ has
two parts. The first part covers an interim or final determination of any industrial
dispute. The second part takes in an interim or final determination of any question
relating to that dispute but the basic postulate common to both the parts of the
definition is the existence of an industrial dispute, actual or apprehended.

The ‘determination’ contemplated by the definition is not a termination

of the proceedings before the tribunal, by one method or the other. There is a
‘determination’ only when there is adjudication of the industrial dispute or of a
question relating thereto, on merits. The word ‘determination’ implies adjudication
upon the relevant materials, by the tribunal.
 The determination can be final or interim but it should be clear and not
incomplete, it should not be left unresolved, because the expression ‘determination’
implies that the adjudicator has to adjudicate upon the whole dispute to be resolved
by the parties.

Interim Award and Interim Relief

The word interim is defined in the Oxford dictionary as a temporary or provisional

arrangement adopted in the meanwhile. In the context of definition of the term ‘award’ the word
interim qualifies the determination of any industrial dispute as well as any question relating
thereto.

Hence any interim determination of an industrial dispute itself or any question relating
thereto will fall within the definition of award. An interim award in this context means only a
provisional arrangement made in a matter of urgency and subject to final adjustment or complete
determination of the dispute. For example, the court may give a decision that an industry should
pay some amount to its workers on account pending the final settlement of the amount.

In the case of Hotel Imperial the Supreme Court held that the adjudicator may give an
award about the entire dispute at the end of the proceedings, which will be final determination of
the industrial dispute referred to it. It is also open to the adjudicator to make an award in respect
of some of the matters referred to it, while some others remain to be decided. This would be
determination of matters decided and would be an interim award. Whether the award is interim
or final it will have to be published as required by section 17.

Though an industrial tribunal can give an interim relief, ‘ordinarily, interim relief should
not be the whole relief that the workmen would get, if they succeeded finally. In a case of
discharge or dismissal, it is not open to the tribunal to order a reinstatement as an interim relief,
for that would be giving the workman the very relief that he could get on a trial of the complaint,
if the employer fails to justify the order of dismissal.

Compromise Award

The Industrial Disputes Act 1947 does not contain any provision specifically
authorizing an industrial adjudicator to record a compromise and pass an award which may look
like a Compromise award.

But this does not mean that the tribunal is precluded from taking a note of a
compromise entered into between workers and management. It would be unreasonable for
industrial tribunal to deal with the dispute on merits even after knowing that dispute has been
settled by both the parties , therefore industrial tribunal would immediately agree to make an
award in terms of settlement between the parties.

The Bombay high court in Maharana Mill, while dealing with a case of withdrawal of a
dispute by parties from adjudication also made an observation that the position might have been
different if the dispute had been settled on merits by private agreement and the tribunal had been
asked to make an award in terms of agreement.

In Hindustan HFE Union, Delhi high court observed that Compromise award should
not be considered as award unless it bears tribunal opinion that is fair, just and equitable. The
court held that compromise award is as good as award made by the tribunal after contest and is to
be treated as an award so long it resolves the dispute between the parties which had been referred
to the tribunal for adjudication and is not tainted with fraud, collusion, coercion or undue
influence.
Ex Parte Award:

Section 15 of Industrial Disputes Act makes it a duty to tribunal to make an award and
submit it to appropriate government. Rule 10B of the Industrial disputes (Central) Rules 1957
prescribed the procedure to be adopted by the tribunal when a reference is made to it and the
scheme of the rule makes it clear that the tribunal must make a pronouncement on the validity of
the claim made by one party and repudiated by the other. Although Rule 22 empowers the
tribunal to proceed ex parte, when one of the parties to the proceedings before it fails to appear,
the adjudicator is not absolved of his duty to make the determination of the dispute which he is
called upon to decide.

In RB Girap, the labour court dismissed the reference because on the filing the claim
statement of the workman, neither the workman nor his advocate was present. But when the
workman became aware of the order of the labour court, his advocate advised him that the
application for setting aside the order need not be filed till the award is published in the
government gazette. After publication of the award, the workman filed for application, for
restoration, which was rejected by the labour court as time barred. The award was quashed by
Bombay high court, restoring the matter to the labour court as time barred. The delay in making
application for restoration was condoned for the reason that the poor employees drawing
negligible wages should not be denied the opportunity of being heard on merits by the labour
court, and he should not be punished for the erroneous advice given to him by the lawyer.
Conclusion:

From the study of this concept of “Award” under Industrial Disputes Act , it can be
said that Award means interim or final determination of any industrial dispute between employer
and workers. There are many types of award as per Industrial Disputes Act like Interim Award,
Compromise award and Ex Parte award.

In case of Interim award the court may give award for the being in favour of workers
and same may be required to give by employer to worker on immediate basis which may change
when the final decision of the case is given. Interim award is given to give temporary relief to the
workers of the organization.

In case of Compromise award both the parties agree to certain terms and same are
communicated to the adjudicator and on the basis of that he gives award to the workers after
taking consent from both the parties to the suit. This is known as compromise award.

In case of Ex parte award , when any one worker or employer and their lawyer remain
absent in court proceedings, court may pass an order giving ex parte award listening to only one
party and as other party is absent in the proceedings he has to accept to the decision of the court.
Bibliography:
1. O P Malhotra’s “The Law of Industrial Disputes 7th Edition.