BONDED LABOUR ABOLITION ACT, 1976
The term ‘bonded labour’ has been defined by the
National Commission on Labour as “labour which remains in bondage for a
specific period for the debt incurred”. The Commissioner for Scheduled Castes
and Scheduled Tribes explained the term bonded labour in its 24th report as
“persons who are forced to work for the creditors for the loan incurred either
without wage or on nominal wage”.
The ‘bonded labour’ is different from ‘contract
labour’ employed in industries, mines, plantations and docks, etc. Contract
labour includes workers who are not directly recruited by the establishment,
whose names do not appear on the pay-roll and who are not paid wages directly
by the employer. In theory, contract labourers in India are covered by the
Factory Act, 1948, the Mines Act, 1952, the Plantations Labour Act, 1951 and
the Dock Workers Act, 1948 so as to give them benefits as are admissible to
labour directly employed.
Article
23(1) of the Constitution prohibits "begar" and other similar forms
of forced labour and it provides that any contravention of the said prohibition
shall be an offence. But inspite of this provision a system of usuary under
which the debtor or his decendants or dependants have to work for the creditor
without reasonable wages or with no wages in order to extinguish the debt,
existed in many parts of the country. It has been found that several
generations work under bondage for the repayment of a small sum which had been
taken by some remote ancestor. This system of bondage implies the infringement
of basic human rights and destruction of the dignity of human labour. The evils
of bonded labour, having been recognised by many voluntary organisations, were
highlighted by them. Many voluntary organisations raised their heads against
such a system. Accordingly the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Ordinance, 1975
was promulgated by the President on 24th October, 1975. To replace the said
Ordinance the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Bill, 1976 was introduced in the
Parliament.
Causes
of Bonded Labour:
Though the main causes of origin, growth and
perpetuation of bonded labour system are economic, the social and religious
factors to support the custom. The economic causes include: extreme poverty of
people, inability to find work for livelihood, inadequate size of the
landholdings to support family, lack of alternative small-scale loans for the
rural and urban poor, natural calamities like drought, floods etc., destruction
of men ‘ animals, absence of rains, drying away of wells, meagre income from
forest produce, and inflation and constant rising prices.
The social factors include:
High expenses on occasions like marriage, death,
feast, birth of a child, etc., leading to heavy debts, caste-based
discrimination, lack of concrete social welfare schemes to safeguard against
hunger and illness, non- compulsory and unequal educational system, and
indifference and corruption among government officials.
Offences and procedure for trial:
1.
Punishment for
enforcement of bonded labour.-Whoever, after the commencement of this
Act, compels any person to render any bonded labour shall be punishable with
imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and also with fine
which may extend to two thousand rupees.
COMMENTS Punishment for compelling any person to
rendor any bonded labour is imprisonment for three years and a fine of two
thousand rupees-
2.
Punishment for
advancement of bonded debt.-Whoever advances, after the commencement of this
Act, any bonded debt shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may
extend to three years and also with fine which may extend to two thousand
rupees.
3.
Punishment for
extracting bonded labour under the bonded labour system.- Whoever enforces
after the commencement of this Act, any custom, tradition, contract, agreement
or other instrument, by virtue of which any person or any member of the family
of such person or any dependent of such person is required to render any
service under the bonded labour system, shall be punishable with imprisonment
for a term which may extend to three years and also with fine which may extend
to two thousand rupees; and, out of the fine, if recovered, payment shall be
made to the bonded labourer at the rate of rupees five for each day for which
the bonded labour was extracted from him.
4.
Punishment for
omission or failure to restore possession of property to bonded labourers.-Whoever, being
required by this Act to restore any property to the possession of any bonded
labourer, omits or fails to do so, within a period of thirty days from the
commencement of this Act, shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term
which may extend to one year, or with fine which may extend to one thousand
rupees, or with both; and, out of the fine, if recovered, payment shall be made
to the bonded labourer at the rate of rupees five for each day during which
possession of the property was not restored to him ;
5.
Abetment to be
an offence.-
Whoever abets any offence punishable under this Act shall, whether or not the
offence abetted is committed, be punishable with the same punishment as is
provided for the offence which has been abetted. Explanation.-For the purpose
of this Act, "abetment" has the meaning assigned to it in the Indian
Penal Code (45 of 1860).
6.
Offences to be
tried by Executive Magistrates.-(1) The State Government may confer,
on an Executive Magistrate, the powers of a Judicial Magistrate of the first
class or of the second class for the trial of offences under this Act; and, on
such conferment of powers, the Executive Magistrate on whom the powers are so
conferred, shall be deemed, for the purposes of the Code of Criminal Procedure,
1973 (2 of 1974), to be a Judicial Magistrate of the first class, or of the
second class, as the case may be.
(2) An offence under this Act may be tried
summarily by a Magistrate.
7.
Cognizance of
offences.-Every
offence under this Act shall be cognizable and bailable.
8.
Offences by
companies.-(1)
Where an offence under this Act has been committed by a company, every person
who, at the time the offence was committed, was in charge of, and was
responsible to, the company for the conduct of the business of the company, as
well as the company, shall be deemed to be guilty of the offence and shall be
liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.
(2) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (1), where any
offence under this Act,
has been committed by a company and it is proved that the offence has been
committed with the consent or
connivance of, or is attributable to, any neglect on the part of, any director,
manager, secretary or other officer of the company, such director, manager,
secretary or other officer shall be deemed to be guilty of that offence and shall
be liable to be proceeded against and punished accordingly.
Explanation.-For
the purposes of this section,-
(a) "company" means any body
corporate and includes a firm or other association of individuals; and
(b) "director", in relation to a firm,
means a partner in the firm.
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