Minimum wage fixation is administrative, with zone-wise classification and food valuation upheld, but child and apprentice coverage was invalid.

Section 5(1) of the Minimum Wages Act permits the Government to choose between committee-based and proposal-based wage fixation according to the material available, and that choice is not arbitrary or contrary to Article 14. Fixation of minimum wages is administrative, not quasi-judicial, so a mandatory hearing or prior consultation with affected employers is not required as a matter of right. The Advisory Board's constitution and the inclusion of the hotel industry in the Schedule did not invalidate the notification. Zone-wise wage classification was upheld, and food supplied to employees could be valued for deduction, but the notification was invalid to the extent it applied adult rates to children, adolescents certified to work as children, and apprentices.

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Issues: (i) whether the alternative procedure under Section 5(1) of the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 conferred unguided discretion or offended Article 14; (ii) whether fixation of minimum wages was a quasi-judicial function requiring observance of natural justice and prior consultation with affected employers; (iii) whether the constitution of the Advisory Board and the inclusion of hotel industry in the Schedule vitiated the notification; (iv) whether the zonal classification and the rates fixed for different classes of employees, including children, adolescents and apprentices, were legally sustainable; and (v) whether the valuation and set-off of food supplied to employees was authorised and reasonable.

Issue (i): whether the alternative procedure under Section 5(1) of the Minimum Wages Act, 1948 conferred unguided discretion or offended Article 14.

Analysis: The statutory scheme allowed the appropriate Government either to appoint a committee or to publish proposals and consider representations. That choice was controlled by the Act itself, because the Government was to use the committee route where it lacked sufficient material and the proposal route where it already had adequate information. The existence of alternative procedures did not by itself make the power arbitrary or discriminatory.

Conclusion: The challenge to Section 5(1) on the ground of Article 14 failed.

Issue (ii): whether fixation of minimum wages was a quasi-judicial function requiring observance of natural justice and prior consultation with affected employers.

Analysis: The Act and the Rules did not require notice, oral hearing, or adjudication of rival rights. The committees and the Advisory Board were only investigatory and advisory, and the Government, while fixing wages, acted to inform itself of relevant conditions rather than to decide a lis. On that footing, the fixation of minimum wages was administrative in character, so natural justice was not attracted as a matter of right. Consultation with the Advisory Board was not compulsory for initial fixation under the Act, though it was consulted in fact.

Conclusion: The fixation process was not quasi-judicial, and the absence of a mandatory hearing or compulsory prior consultation did not invalidate the notification.

Issue (iii): whether the constitution of the Advisory Board and the inclusion of hotel industry in the Schedule vitiated the notification.

Analysis: Persons representing employers need not themselves be individual employers, and Government officials could validly serve as independent persons in an advisory body of this character. At most, any defect in the constitution of the Board was of a minor character and did not vitiate the wage fixation. The belated objection to inclusion of hotel industry in the Schedule was unsupported by material and could not be accepted.

Conclusion: The Board's constitution did not invalidate the notification, and the inclusion of hotel industry in the Schedule was upheld.

Issue (iv): whether the zonal classification and the rates fixed for different classes of employees, including children, adolescents and apprentices, were legally sustainable.

Analysis: Section 3 of the Act authorised different rates for different localities and different classes of employees. The division into three zones was supported by relevant considerations such as cost of living, economic conditions and industrial development. However, the notification did not lawfully cater to children, adolescents certified to work as children, and apprentices, for whom different rates could and should have been fixed under the Act. Adult rates could not be applied to those categories.

Conclusion: The zonal classification and adult wage structure were upheld, but the notification was invalid insofar as it applied to children, adolescents certified to work as children, and apprentices.

Issue (v): whether the valuation and set-off of food supplied to employees was authorised and reasonable.

Analysis: Food supplied by the employer could be treated as an amenity for purposes of deduction, and the Government was competent to fix a general valuation for such amenity in a zone-wise notification. The petitioners did not establish that the valuation fixed was unreasonably low. By contrast, lodging, water and light were expressly excluded from wages under the Act, so no deduction could be claimed for them.

Conclusion: The valuation of food and the corresponding deduction were valid, while no deduction could be claimed for lodging, water or light.

Final Conclusion: The Court upheld the impugned wage fixation in substance, but struck it down to the limited extent that it failed to exclude children, adolescents certified to work as children, and apprentices from its operation.

Ratio Decidendi: Where the statute itself supplies the criterion for choosing between alternative procedures and makes the wage-fixing function administrative rather than adjudicatory, the Government's fixation of minimum wages will not be invalid for want of hearing or for mere procedural objections, save to the extent that the notification exceeds the classes of employees authorised by the Act.

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