Retrospective applicability of the Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act 2015, stayed

Bombay High Court: The Court, consisting of V.M. Kanade and M.S. Sonak, JJ stayed the retrospective applicability of the Payment of Bonus (Amendment) Act, 2015, as provided by Section 1 sub-clause (2)  of the said Central Act, bearing in mind similar stays operative by the judgments of the Karnataka High Court (see post here), the Allahabad High Court (see post here) and Kerala High Court (see post here).  The Court decreed that no coercive steps would be taken to recover amounts due prior to 31^st March 2016 from Petitioners Tech Mahindra, who were represented by Darius Khambatta, under instructions from Khaitan and Co. It must be noted that these amounts became formally due after change in Section 12 (calculation of  bonus with regard to certain employees), whereupon if salary or wage of employee exceeded Rs. 7000/- or the minimum wage for the scheduled employment, as fixed by the appropriate Government, the calculation is to be made as percentage of Rs. 7000/- or such minimum wage, whichever is higher.. The earlier threshold was set to Rs. 3500/-. [Tech Mahindra v. Union of India, 2016 SCC OnLine Bom 4380, order dated 13-06-2015]