State cannot misuse its dominant position by fixing lower wages of Govt. employees

The State cannot misuse its dominant position by fixing lower wages of Cook employed for proving mid-day meal, resulting into forced labour which amounts to violation of fundamental right of worker and is prohibited.

If a person provides labour or service to another against receipt of the minimum wage, it would not be possible to say that the labour or service provided by him is "forced labour" because he gets what he is entitled under law to receive. No inference can reasonably be drawn in such a case that he is forced to provide labour or service for the simple reason that he would be providing labour or service against receipt of what is lawfully payable to him just like any other person who is not under the force of any compulsion. But where a person provides labour or service to another for remuneration which is less than the minimum wage, the labour or service provided by him clearly falls within the scope and ambit of “forced labour." Such a person would be entitled to come to the Court for enforcement of his fundamental right by asking the court to direct payment of the minimum wage to him so that the labour or service provided by him ceases to be "forced labour".

Payment of wages at the rate of Rs. 1,000/- per month since the year 2005 up to 2019 to a Cook of mid-day meals, is clearly a form of Forced Labour, which is prohibited under Article 23 of the Constitution. The Cook beings a poor lady has no other source of income was never in a position to bargain with the might of the State and continued to suffer. Court being a custodian of the fundamental rights cannot shut its eyes to such injustice. Therefore the Court issued direction to State to ensure that proper payment of wages was made after calculating statutory minimum wages to all the cooks employed for providing mid-day meal in the Institutions run by the Government or Semi-Government bodies.