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Unit 12: Payment of Bonus Act, 1965

4. Nothing contained in this section shall enable an Inspector to require a banking company to Notes
furnish or disclose any statement or information or to produce, or give inspection of any of its
books of account or other documents, which a banking company cannot be compelled to furnish,
disclose, produce or give inspection of, under the provisions of section 34A of the Banking
Regulation Act, 1949 (10 of 1949).
12.5.2 Offences and Penalties [Sec. 28 & 29]

The offences and penalties of Inspectors are as follows:
1. For contravention of the provisions of the Act or rules the penalty is imprisonment upto 6
months or fine up to 1000, or both.
2. In case of offences by companies, every person who, at the time the offence was committed,
was in charge of, and was responsible to, the company for the conduct of business of the company,
as well as the company, shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence and shall be liable to be
proceeded against and punished accordingly: any such person liable to any punishment if he
proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge or that he exercised all due
diligence to prevent the commission of such offence.

Self Assessment

Fill in the blanks:
13. The appropriate government may, by notification in the ........................... appoint such
persons as it thinks fit to be Inspectors for the purposes of this Act and may define the
limits within which they shall exercise jurisdiction.
14. Every ........................... shall be deemed to be a public servant within the meaning of the
Indian Penal Code (45 of 1860).

15. For contravention of the provisions of the Act or rules the penalty is imprisonment up to
........................... months or fine up to 1000, or both.



Case Study Mumbai Kamgar Sabha, Bombay vs M/s Abdulbhai
Faizullabhai & Ors on 10th March, 1976

considerable number of workmen were employed by a large number of small
businessmen in a locality in the city. Prior to 1965, the employers made ex-gratia
Apayment to the workers by way of bonus which they stopped from that year. A
Board of Arbitrators appointed under sec. 10A of the Industrial Disputes Act, to which the
bonus dispute was referred, rejected the workers demand for bonus. The dispute was
eventually referred to an Industrial Tribunal which in limine dismissed the workers’
demand as being barred by res judicata, in view of the decision of the Arbitration Board.
The Tribunal, in addition, held that bonus so far paid having been founded on tradition
and custom, did not fall within the four-corners of the Bonus Act which is a complete code
and came to the conclusion that the workers were not entitled bonus. On appeal to this
Court it was contended that (i) the appellant-Union not being a party to the dispute had no
locus standi, (ii) the claim of the workmen not being profit-based bonus, which is what the
Bonus Act deals with, the Act has no application to this case; and (iii) since no case of

Contd....

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