Report of the Royal Commission on Labour in India

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1850495947

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-233603

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Report of the Royal Commission on Labour in India

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: His Majesty's Stationery Off.

Year of publication:: 1931

Scope:: xviii, 580 S.; graph. Darst., Kt.

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Chapter XVIII. - Industrial disputes

Collection:: Economics Books

INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES. 247 in the leading industrial provinces would be the appointment of a perma- nent official chairman with whom different members could be associat- ed in different cases, but there is nothing in the present Act to pre- vent a local Government from re-appointing the same chairmanin each dispute. Amendment of the Trade Disputes Act. In respect of one section, we recommend an immediate amend- ment of the present Act. Section 13 is designed to prevent the disclosure by members of Courts or Boards of confidential information relating to trade unions or individual businesses. The main part of the section fol- lows generally the British Act, but to this are appended provisions render- ing any member of a Court or Board liable to prosecution at the instance of the person aggrieved by a wrongful disclosure. The members do not receive the protection against criminal prosecution ordinarily granted bo public servants in respect of acts done in the execution of their duties, nor is it necessary for the prosecution to show that the disclosure was wilful or to prove that any injury has been done. Moreover no protection appears to be granted against a civil suit. We are inclined to doubt if a criminal prosecution is at all appropriate, at any rate in connection with a disclosure in an official report. It would perhaps be sufficient in a temporary Act of this kind to provide that no prosecution or suit should be maintainable on account of any breach of the section or any damage caused thereby, except with the previous sanction of the (Government which appointed the tribunal. Neglect of Conciliation. In concluding this chapter, we would emphasise the fact that the most useful form of State assistance in dealing with trade disputes is scarcely employed in India. The official outlook, like that of the public, has been concentrated largely on the final stages of disputes. As a rule committees and tribunals have been set up only when disputes had attained considerable magnitude, and when a strike was either imminent or in being. Individual officers, on the comparatively rare occasions when they have intervened, have also waited, as a rule, till the later stages. It is at the climax of a dispute, when the parties have com- pletely failed to reach a common standpoint, that settlement is most difficult. At this stage public opinion tends to demand action. Govern- ment, which has been either unaware or a passive spectator of the earlier stages, may be compelled to intervene, and such intervention nearly alwavs partakes more of the nature of arbitration than conciliation. Conciliation Officers. It is in the earlier stages that assistance of the right kind can be most valuable. We do not suggest that the heavy artillery of the Trade Disputes Act should be used at this stage ; we would repeat that it is far better to get the parties to a dispute to settle it themselves than to put forward a settlement for them and attempt, by invoking public Dbinion or otherwise, to give it force. There are frequent occasions

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