Customary bonus under Section 33-C(2) requires a proven pre-existing right based on uniform, profit-independent practice or implied agreement.

A claim for customary bonus under Section 33-C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act is maintainable only if workmen prove a pre-existing legal right, either through a long, uniform and profit-independent practice or through an implied agreement forming a condition of service. The materials here showed bonus payments made after repeated demands and negotiations, with varying rates and no proof of payment in years of loss or irrespective of profits. The record therefore failed the established tests for customary bonus, and the correspondence also did not establish any implied contractual entitlement. On that basis, no enforceable right capable of computation was shown.

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Issues: Whether the employees had established an existing right to customary bonus, or an implied contractual entitlement as a condition of service, so as to maintain a claim under Section 33-C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.

Analysis: The materials showed that bonus payments had been made pursuant to repeated negotiations and demands, with the rate varying from year to year. The payments were not uniform, and the record did not show that they were made irrespective of profits or in years of loss. The established tests for customary bonus require an unbroken and sufficiently long practice, payment even in years of loss, absence of dependence on profits, and uniformity of rate. The evidence did not satisfy those requirements. The correspondence also negatived any implied agreement that the payment was a customary bonus forming part of service conditions. In these circumstances, there was no pre-existing legal right capable of being quantified under Section 33-C(2).

Conclusion: No enforceable right to customary bonus or corresponding condition of service was proved, and the claim under Section 33-C(2) was not maintainable.

Final Conclusion: The appeal failed because the claimed bonus was held not to be customary bonus in law and the workmen had no existing right capable of enforcement through computation proceedings.

Ratio Decidendi: A claim for customary bonus under Section 33-C(2) is maintainable only where a pre-existing legal right is proved on the basis of a long, uniform, and profit-independent practice, or an implied agreement amounting to a condition of service.

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