ALL INDIA REPORTER KARAMCHARI SANGH V. ALL INDIA REPORTER LTD.
1988 Supp SCC 472: AIR 1988 SC 132
FACTS
On behalf of Respondent 1, it was urged before this Hon'ble court that the law reports published by it were not newspapers as defined in the Working Journalists and Other Newspaper Employees (Conditions of Service) and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1955 and therefore the order made by the Central Government on the basis of the recommendations of Justice Palekar were not applicable to its establishment. The High Court accepted the plea of Respondent 1 and declared that the law reports were not newspapers within the meaning of Section 2(b) of the Working Journalists and Other Newspaper Employees (Conditions of Service) and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1955 and the demand made by the Deputy Labour Commissioner to comply with the order made by the Central Government on the basis of the recommendations of Justice Palekar was unsustainable by its judgement dated April 22, 1983.
ISSUE
The issue pertaining to the current case is whether the law reports namely All India Reporter, Criminal Law Journal, Labour and Industrial Cases, Taxation Law Reports, Allahabad Law Journal and U.P. Law Tribune published by Respondent 1, All India Reporter Limited, are considered newspapers as defined in the Working Journalists and Other Newspaper Employees (Conditions of Service) and Miscellaneous Provisions Act, 1955 {hereinafter referred to as the “Act”}
RULES
Multiple Sections were referred to in the current case however only the most relevant ones are being explained here.
Section 2(b) of the Act defines a “Newspaper” and states that “Newspaper’ means any printed periodical work containing public news or comments on public news and includes such other class of printed periodical work as may, from time to time, be notified in this behalf by the Central Government in the official Gazette”. Further, Section 2(c) of the Act defines a “Newspaper Employee” and states that an “employee refers to any working journalist, and includes any other person employed to do any work in, or in relation to, any newspaper establishment”. Entry 39 of List III of the Indian Constitution was also discussed that mentions “Newspapers, books and printing presses.” Newspapers and books are mentioned as separate items.
INTENTION OF THE STATUTE
The act in questions was enacted with the purpose of improving the conditions of service of the employees of the newspaper establishments and even if there exists two opinions on the construction of the provisions of the act, the opinion that advances the object and purpose of the act and is favourable to the employees for whose benefit the Act was passed, has to be accepted.
JUDGEMENT AND ANALYSIS
- This Hon'ble court observed that a work can be regarded as a newspaper if it is a (i) printed work, (ii) a periodical and (iii) should contain public news or comments on public news. It examined that there existed no dispute that the law reports are printed works and are considered as periodicals. The court also observed that the term “news” wasn’t defined in the Act. The definition given in the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary was referred to by the court. It defined news as means tidings, new information of recent events; new occurrences as a subject of report or talk.
- Entry 39 of List III consists of Newspapers and Books as separate items but the distinction between them sometimes gets thin or vanishes entirely. To support its claim, this Hon'ble court cited a passage from Report of the Royal Commission on the Press (1947-49) “The newspaper and periodical press of Great Britain consists of over 4000 publications ranging from newspapers famous throughout the world to the journals of obscure societies. Its limits are ill-defined, for there is no definition of either ‘newspaper’ or ‘periodical’ which enables each to be infallibly distinguished from the other and from publications which are properly speaking neither. The term ‘newspaper’ is usually applied (except so far as concerns the important class of trade newspapers) to publications devoted mainly to recording current events, and ‘periodicals’ to magazines, reviews, and journals which, insofar as they are concerned with current events at all, are concerned to comment rather than to report; but newspapers merge into advertising sheets, periodicals into books and pamphlets, and both into one another”
- This Hon'ble court also referred to judgements such as P.S.V. lyer v. CST which held that the Cuttack Law Times wasn’t a newspaper because it failed to fulfil the necessary prerequisites (i.e. it should contain public news or comments on public news). However, books containing authoritative reports for future references couldn’t become a newspaper. Hence, the High Court of Orissa held that the sale of Cuttack Law Times was not a newspaper and couldn’t be taxed by the State legislature under Entry 54 of List II of the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution of India. Similarly, in T.V. Ramnath v. Union of India the court observed a decline to follow the decision upheld by the Orissa High Court. It upheld Madras Law Journal, a law journal published from japan to be a newspaper and it attracted the provisions of the act. This Hon'ble court agreed with the decision of the madras High Court and disagreed with that of the Orissa High Court stating that the Hon'ble court failed to take into consideration that information about recent decisions of courts of record could be news in which the public was interested. The fact that a law report could be used as a reference book at a later stage was not sufficient to hold that the law report did not contain public news when it was received by the subscriber.
- This Hon'ble court also observed that law reports contain judicial decisions which are of public importance. The contents of the news constitute news as they contain information related to the latest legal position prevailing in the country on specific issues. The decisions in the law reports might cease to remain as news items and may become books, but at the time of reaching the subscribers, they consist of the characteristics of news. The act is a beneficial legislation enacted for the purpose of improving the conditions of the employees of the newspaper establishments. It was stated that law reports include newly enacted Acts, rules and regulations, book reviews etc. and was observed that such items might not be able to substantially make it into a newspaper, the publication of the recent judgments is sufficient to make a law report a newspaper which in future can become a book reference. The court further emphasised that even if two opinions of construction existed,, the one that advances the object of the act was accepted.
- Hence, it was concluded by this Hon'ble court that reports are newspapers within the meaning of the Act and the employees employed within the production and publication of law reports are entitled to the Palekar Award.
RELEVANT THEORY
Purposive Construction discusses the importance of the purport and object of the act. It also states that a statute must be read in its entirety and purport and object of the Act must be given its full effect by applying principles of purposive construction. A purposive construction promoting the object of the enactment but not extending its sweep beyond the frontiers within which it was intended to operate must be adopted keeping in view that a construction which exempts a person from its operation must be preferred to the one which includes him in it, in view of the penal nature of the statue. It is normally based on three components namely, language, purpose and discretion. It is the duty of the courts to accept a construction which promotes the object of the legislation and also prevents its possible abuse even though the mere possibility of abuse of a provision does not affect its Constitutionality or construction. Abuse has to be checked by constant vigilance and monitoring of individual cases and this can be done by screening of the cases by suitable machinery at a high level. Further, Purposive construction can only be resorted to when language of a provision is capable of more than one interpretation. Where literal construction or plain meaning may cause hardship, futility, absurdity or uncertainty, the purposive or contextual construction may be preferred to arrive at a more just, reasonable and sensible result.