TRUST OF INDIA AND ANR. versus UNION OF INDIA & ANR.

Citation: [1975] 3 S.C.R. 499 · Decided: 23-04-1974 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: P. JAGANMOHAN REDDY · Disposal: Disposed off
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Judgment (excerpt)

A 
c 
D 
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499 
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA AND ANR. 
\!. 
UNION OF INDIA & ANR. 
April 23, 1974 
[P. J..\GANMOHAN REDDY AND S. N. DWIVEDI .. JJ.] 
Worki11g Journalists (Co11ditions of Servia) and Miscdlaneous 
Provisions 
Act (45 of 
1955), 
s. 
10-Recommendarion by Wage Board of wages etc. 
of 1rnrki11R Joumalists-Rea.wnab/wes.1· of-Classifica1ion of P. T.l.;_Jf vwlative 
of A rt. 14. 
Practice and Procedure-Substit111/on of shareholder of company affected as 
per;1ioner 10 challenge order on the basi.1 of Art. 19-Propriety. 
The Central Government by an order dated October 27, 1967, accepted 
substantially the recommendations of the Wage Board constituted under s. 9 of 
the Working Journalists (Conditions of Service) and Miscellaneous Provision~ 
Act, 1955, in respect of wages etc. of working journalists. The Press Trust of 
lrnlia (P.T.I.) and the Indian National Press Ltd., tiled writ petitiou5 challenging 
the order of the Government accepting the recommendations. The P.T.I. con-
tended that, ( 1) it was discriminated against both in respect of the classifica-
tion and in the fixation of wages; (2) there was a violation of s. 10 of tht 
Act as the Wage Board bad not taken into consideration it5 capacity to pay; 
and (3) the Board exceeded its jurisdiction in 8Warding 
to 
the 
employee! 
wages higher than what were demanded. 
Allowing the writ petition of the P.T.I. and dismissing that of the Ind.ian 
National Press. 
HE·LD : The order of the Central Government, in ~o far as the P.T.I. is 
concerned i5 struck down a.nd the P.T.I. directed to pay the wages agreed to 
between the P.T.I. and its employees from the date when wages were payable 
according to the, recommendation of the Wago Board, till the wage& are re-fixed 
by the Central Government on the recommendations of another Wage Board. 
No case was made out by the Indian National Press that it had no capacity to 
meet the wage increase, particularly when it bad been placed in the appropriat• 
class in which it should have been placed on the basis of ih gross profits. 
[518 D; HJ 
( 1) (a) The definition of 'newspaper establishment' cannot be drawn on for 
the purposes of justifying only one classification of all the establishment included 
in that definition. 
Obviously newspapers and news agencies have different 
functions. 
They have different sources of revenue and the services rendered 
by each are different. 
Also, the broad classification may again be subdivided 
and sub-classified according to the capacity of ead of the categories. [509 A-C] 
( b) The Wage Board in its recommendations has stated that for the pur-
poses of fixation of Wages for working journalists, newspapers and news agencies 
should be classified in the manner therein provided and that such classification 
should be based on the gross revenues for the accounting years 1963, 1964 
and 1965. 
On this basis newspaix:rs and news agencies have 
been 
divided 
into 7 dasses, class II containing establishments with gross revenue between 
Rs. 100 and Rs. 200 la.khs, and Class III between Rs. 50 and Rs. 100 Iakhs. 
[509 DJ 
( c) The classification is b11Sed on intelligible differential namely, the capa-
city of each news agency to pay; and between News p~pers and news agencies, 
on the nature of the service rendered, the sources of income and the manner 
in which the iervice is rendered. The criteria for classification also bears a 
rational reh.tionship to the object to be achieved, namely, wages 
to be fixei!. 
[510 GJ 
( d) But it is. well established that even where legislative action or any action 
taken is und.er any law against a 1;ingle individual of things ·or several individual 
500 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[1975] 3 :5.C.R. 
persons or things where no reasonable basis for classification may appear on 
the face of it or dedudbh: f'rom the surrounding cirr;umstances, that action is 
lrnble to be stmck down as an insiance of discrimination. 
(510 HJ 
Ameerunnissa Begl11n and Ors. v. Mahboob Begum and Ors., (1953] S.C.R. 
404, Ram Pwsad Kararnn Sahi and Anr. v. The State of Bihar and Ors., (1953] 
S.C.R. 1129 and Shri Ram Krishna Dalmia v. Shri Justice S. R. Tendo/kar and 
Ors., (1959] S.C.R. 279 at 299. 
(e) The P.T.I. has been placed in the category of Class II Jnstead ,Jf class 
III, to which it admitted!)'. belongs. 
There is however, no mdication as to 
wlw e::tenl the Wage Board has considered the relevant materials either of the 
Press Commission, or in an award in the indust
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