Jammu and Kashmir High Court: A Single Judge Bench of Sanjeev Kumar, J., admitted the petition instituted for payment of wages at par with the persons doing a similar job.
The facts of the case are that the petitioners were working as casual laborers in the respondent-department. They were getting lesser wages than other workers who were involved in similar nature of work and therefore, they contended that they were being discriminated.
The Court held that firstly if the petitioners were working as casual/daily rated workers with the respondent-department they cannot be denied the wages as provided under the Minimum Wages Act. At the same time, if the persons who were performing the similar duties/work as were being performed by the petitioners got paid more, then the similar benefit could not be denied to the petitioners. The petition was thus allowed. [Nazir Ahmad Dar v. State of J&K,2018 SCC OnLine J&K 980, decided on 12-12-2018]