The Madras High Court has been closing down most of the public interest litigation (PIL) petitions filed during COVID-19 with respect to issues such as non-availability of oxygen cylinders, hospital beds, and medicines. However, if there is one issue which the court has refused to close as infructuous, it is that of the mandatory registration of migrant labourers.
On January 24, a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by K. Vijayan in 2020 was listed before the first Division Bench of Chief Justice Sanjay V. Gangapurwala and Justice D. Bharatha Chakravarthy. V. Ajoy Khose, counsel for the petitioner, said the case was filed for effective implementation of the Inter-State Migrant Workmen (Regulation of Employment and Conditions of Service) Act, 1979.
Registering officers
The lawyer brought it to the notice of the court that the 1979 law would apply to every establishment or contractor who had engaged five or more inter-State migrant workmen involved in skilled, semi-skilled or unskilled, manual, supervisory, technical or clerical work. Section 3 of the Act requires the State government to appoint registering officers with varied territorial jurisdictions.
The Act also requires the principal employers to get themselves registered under the Act by making an application and on payment of prescribed fees and Section 6 states that no principal employer, of an establishment to which the Act applies, should employ inter-State migrant workmen unless a certificate of registration in respect of such an establishment has been issued under the Act.
Similarly, the law insists on appointment of Licensing Officers to issue licences to contractors who engage the services of inter-State workmen and has provisions for revocation and suspension of, and amendment to, the registration certificates and the licences. It also mandates issuance of passbooks to the workmen containing details of their service conditions, wages, and so on in their local language.
Payment of allowances
Further, the law underscores the need to pay these workers displacement allowance and journey allowance and provide them with residential accommodation, medical facilities, protective clothing, and equal pay for equal work, irrespective of sex. It mandates the principal employer to nominate a representative to be present at the time of disbursement of wages by the contractor and certify the payments.
Despite such a comprehensive legislation having been passed 35 years ago, there has been “no registering officer, no licensing authority, no inspector appointed under the Act,” Mr. Khose complained to the court.
He said the labourers in the State were being registered under the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970, but not under the 1979 law meant exclusively for inter-State migrant workmen.
‘Exploitation going on’
In September 2020, a Division Bench of Justices M.M. Sundresh (now a Supreme Court judge) and R. Hemalatha wrote, “Prima facie, we find that exploitation is going on, spanning the entire State, with respect to the employers in different industries. Therefore, what is required, on the first hand, is to undertake a proper exercise of registration, by including industries which have not done so. Unless registration is done under the 1979 Act, there will not be any recognition of such employees.”
Details sought
After hearing counsel for the PIL petitioner, the first Bench, led by Chief Justice Gangapurwala, directed the State government to file a detailed report before the court by March 27, listing the steps it had taken so far for effective implementation of the 1979 Act. It also called for details of the registration officers, the licensing authorities as well as the inspectors who had been appointed for the welfare of migrant labourers.
