z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-04.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 206
206 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
are provisions in the Indian Penal Code which also deal with this matter, namely, breach of contract of service as a crime, and those sections are 490,
491 and 492. With regard to Act XIII of 1859, that Act was of a limited application. It applied to artificers and artisans ; it applied to cases where artificers and artisans had taken advances from their employers and had subsequently refused to perform the obligations they had undertaken. It was dictated by the necessity of the circumstances. The British Government was faced with the Mutiny. During the period the Mutiny continued, the military engaged many artificers and many artisans to whom monies had been advanced in the expectation that they would render the service which they had undertaken to do, but by reason of fear or by reason of some other circumstances, those artificers and artisans went back to their native places and consequently were not in a position to perform the obligations that they had undertaken, although they had received an advance. It was to cover such cases that this Act of 1859 was passed. It is on record that although this Act was passed, which did make breach of service of contract a crime, it was very rarely put into operation ; it was really not a law which people were brought to suffer under. Sir, the subsequent history of this Act is also interesting. This Act, which stood as a formal statute from 1859, but which, as I said, was never put into operation, was amended in 1920 by Act XII of the Government of India. The amending Act introduced two very salutary principles in this Act One salutary principle that was introduced in this Act was that a magistrate, before punishing an artisan who had committed a breach of contract of service, was authorised to enquire into the equity of the contract, so that, if the magistrate came to the conclusion that the contract was inequitable, men, he was not authorised to punish the recalcitrant workman, notwithstanding the fact that he had taken an advance from his employer. That was the first change that was introduced by the Act of 1920. Then, the second salutary provision that was introduced by the Act of 1920 was that the magistrate was given the power to punish an employer who brought a frivolous complaint,—a provision which was not in the original Act.
Coming to the sections of the Indian Penal Code, the three sections to which I referred have an interesting history. Section 490 dealt with a breach of contract of service during a voyage or journey. It was a section of a very limited application. It did not apply to all breaches of contract of service ; it applied only to seamen who went on a voyage or a journey. Obviously, it was very necessary to make an exception of this kind in the case of service of seamen, on whose continued service the success and safety of the voyage depended. The other section, section 491, related to breach of contract on the part of an attendant in supplying the wants of helpless persons. It applied, for instance, to an ayah who had contracted to take care of a helpless child ; it applied to a servant who had undertaken to supply he needs of a man who was lame and who could not look after