Minimum wage notification preserved task-based work structure, entitling tea plantation labourers to extra pay for excess output.

A minimum wage notification for tea plantation labourers was construed as preserving the existing task-based workload rather than replacing it with an isolated time-rate. Reading the notification with the Government's contemporaneous conduct and the prior task structure, the Court treated the prescribed minimum wages as linked to the stipulated quantity of leaves to be plucked. Labourers were therefore entitled to the fixed basic wage for the specified task and to extra payment at the prevailing rate for work beyond that task. The concurrent findings on entitlement to extra wages were upheld, and no interference was made.

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Issues: Whether the notification fixing minimum wages for tea plantation labourers was correlated to the existing workload or task so as to entitle labourers to extra wages for work done beyond the stipulated quantity of leaves.

Analysis: The notification was read along with the contemporaneous conduct of the Government, the continued reference to the existing tasks and hours of work, and the evidence showing that the labourers had already been working on a fixed task basis before the wage revision. On that footing, the minimum wages fixed for male and female labourers were not treated as an isolated time-rate payable irrespective of output, but as wages linked to the existing task structure. The labourers were therefore entitled to the fixed basic wages for the specified task and to extra payment at the prevailing rate for leaves plucked beyond that task.

Conclusion: The notification was construed as preserving the existing workload or task, and the labourers were held entitled to extra wages for output beyond 16 seers and 12 seers respectively.

Final Conclusion: The appeals failed because the concurrent findings below on the entitlement to extra wages under the notification were upheld, and there was no occasion for interference.

Ratio Decidendi: Where a minimum wage notification expressly preserves the existing task structure, the prescribed minimum wage is correlated to that task and does not displace the employee's right to be paid for work in excess of the task at the established extra rate.

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