Piece-rate service must be counted as qualifying service for pensionary benefits under applicable Government Resolutions.

The petitioner’s predecessor was engaged in the Forest and Environment Department on 2 April 1990 and worked for approximately 22 years before dying in service on 18 February 2012.

His service records intermittently described him as a daily-wage worker and a piece-rate worker.

The petitioner contended that he had worked for more than 240 days in several years and that his piece-rate service had been wrongly excluded from the computation of qualifying service.

The respondents counted only seven years of daily-wage service and excluded nine years of piece-rate service while granting service-related benefits.

The petitioner therefore sought recognition of the piece-rate service for benefits under the Government Resolutions dated 17 October 1988 and 15 September 2014, together with consequential monetary and pensionary benefits.

Whether service rendered by the petitioner as a piece-rate worker could be counted as qualifying service for benefits under the Government Resolutions dated 17 October 1988 and 15 September 2014?

Whether the petitioner was entitled to consequential benefits, including pensionary and monetary benefits, on counting the additional nine years of piece-rate service?

The Court applied the Government Resolutions dated 17 October 1988 and 15 September 2014 governing benefits available to eligible daily-wage employees.

Relying on the Coordinate Bench decision in Special Civil Application No. 3966 of 2016, affirmed in Letters Patent Appeal No. 83 of 2021 and thereafter by the Supreme Court in SLP (C) No. 12097 of 2021, the Court held that the State cannot disregard actual service merely because remuneration was paid on a piece-rate basis.

The Court further relied on PWD Employees’ Union v. State of Gujarat, reported in (2013) 12 SCC 417, and PWD and Forest Union, reported in 2019 (3) Scale 462.

Under Sections 2(s) and 2(rr) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, a person rendering manual, skilled, technical, operational, clerical or supervisory work for remuneration is a “workman,” and remuneration paid for such service constitutes “wages,” irrespective of whether payment is made on a piece-rate basis.

The Court found that the petitioner had rendered nine years of service on a piece-rate basis in addition to seven years as a daily-wage worker.

Applying the settled principle that the mode of payment does not determine the character of employment, the Court held that piece-rate remuneration constituted wages and that the corresponding service could not be excluded merely because the petitioner’s status had been recorded as piece-rate rather than daily-wage service.

Since the binding decisions had already established that such service must be considered for benefits under the relevant Government Resolutions, the respondents’ computation limited to seven years was legally unsustainable.

The respondents were directed to grant and disburse all consequential benefits within eight weeks from receipt of the order.

In default, the amount payable would carry simple interest at 6% per annum.

The Rule was made absolute, with no order as to costs.