Medical representatives are not “workmen” under industrial-disputes legislation, despite the Sales Promotion Employees Act.

The writ petitions raised a common question concerning the status of medical representatives under the U.P. Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (“the 1947 Act”) read with the Sales Promotion Employees (Conditions of Service) Act, 1976 (“the 1976 Act”).

The petitioners relied, inter alia, on M/s Nicholas Piramal India Ltd. v. Presiding Officer, Labour Court, H.R. Adyanthaya v. Sandoz (India) Ltd., and M/s Pfizer Ltd. v. State of U.P., to contend that medical representatives were “workmen” for the purposes of industrial-dispute legislation.

The respondents relied on S.G. Pharmaceuticals, Novartis India Ltd., Sh. Samarendra Das, and Jyoti Kumar, which held that medical representatives engaged principally in sales promotion were not “workmen” under Section 2(s) of the 1947 Act.

The petitions were heard together because they involved the same legal issue.

Whether a medical representative or sales-promotion employee is a “workman” under Section 2(s) of the 1947 Act read with Section 6(2) of the 1976 Act?

Whether the decision in M/s Nicholas Piramal India Ltd., holding that medical representatives are deemed to be workmen under Section 6(2) of the 1976 Act, represented the correct interpretation of H.R. Adyanthaya?

Whether disputes involving medical representatives could be entertained by the Labour Court under the applicable industrial-disputes legislation?

Section 2(s) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 defines a “workman” by reference to persons employed to perform manual, unskilled, skilled, technical, operational, clerical or supervisory work, subject to specified exclusions.

Section 2(d) of the Sales Promotion Employees (Conditions of Service) Act, 1976 includes persons employed to perform work relating to promotion of sales or business, but excludes those mainly employed in managerial or administrative capacities and certain supervisory employees.

Section 6(2) of the 1976 Act extends the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act to sales-promotion employees as they apply to workmen, but does not independently enlarge the substantive definition of “workman” under the 1947 Act.

In May & Baker (India) Ltd. v. Their Workmen, Burmah Shell Oil Storage & Distributing Co. v. Their Workmen, and H.R. Adyanthaya v. Sandoz (India) Ltd., the Supreme Court held that a medical representative principally engaged in canvassing and promoting sales does not perform manual, clerical, skilled, technical, operational or supervisory work within Section 2(s).

The Court also relied on Rhone-Poulenc (India) Ltd. v. State of U.P., and the Division Bench decisions in Novartis India Ltd., S.G. Pharmaceuticals, and Jyoti Kumar, which affirmed that medical representatives are not workmen under the relevant industrial-disputes legislation.

The Court held that H.R. Adyanthaya had been incorrectly understood in Nicholas Piramal.

Although Section 6(2) of the 1976 Act extends the Industrial Disputes Act to sales-promotion employees, it does not automatically make every medical representative a “workman”; the employee must still fall within one of the categories specified in Section 2(s) of the 1947 Act.

The Supreme Court in H.R. Adyanthaya had rejected the argument that medical representatives perform “skilled,” “technical” or “operational” work, observing that sales promotion is distinct from those statutory categories.

The Court further noted that the direction in H.R. Adyanthaya to treat a particular complaint as an industrial dispute was issued under Article 142 of the Constitution and therefore did not establish a general precedent that medical representatives are workmen.

The contrary view in Nicholas Piramal was accordingly not followed, while the reasoning of the cited Division Bench decisions was preferred.

Consequently, disputes concerning such employees could not be entertained by the Labour Court on the footing that they were workmen under the 1947 Act.

The Court declined to follow the contrary reasoning in Nicholas Piramal and dismissed all three writ petitions as devoid of merit.