Law: Industrial Disputes Act, (XIV of 1947)

Section: S. 2 (s)

(On appeal from the award of the Industrial Tribunal, Dacca, in Industrial Dispute Case No. 5/59, published in the Dacca Gazette (Extraordinary), dated the 14th March, 1960).   (a) Industrial Disputes Act (XIV of 1947)-----   ----S. 2 (s) "Workmen" -Salesman not a "workman"-(Pakistan Tabacco Co.).   Persons who are engaged exclusively in the field of distri bution through proper agencies of the products of the Com pany are not assimilable either to the group of workers whose manual labour contributes to that product; or those of the clerical establishment who perform the paper work connected with the operations of the Company. The work of salesmen is in a wholly different category from manual work or clerical work. Salesmen do not therefore fall within the definition of "workmen".   (b) Industrial Disputes Act (XIV of 1947)------   ----S. 2 (k)-"Industrial dispute"-Workmen raising dispute in regard to service conditions of "salesmen"-Dispute not "Industrial dispute"-Main principle of Act-"Any person"-Scope of expression.   Held (Per Cornelius C. J.), that a question of the serving conditions of salesmen of a company is not a question which could validly have been referred to the Tribunal.   A dispute raised by workmen against their employers for the benefit of a class of employees (salesmen) who fall in a totally different category from themselves, is an abuse of the machinery of the Act.   The principle of "direct or substantial interest" of workmen is not involved in such a case where the salesmen constitute, a different category so that there is no normal exchange of personnel between clerks and salesmen, nor is there a connection by any direct line of promotion between them.   If the above principle is conceded in relation to such a dispute the workmen will be given a handle or lever by which they could bring up before Tribunals for adjudication, matters which go to the very essence of the structure of the Company at the highest level.   It may be that salesmen are closer to the workmen in matters of salary and status, beat that…