As per the Employees Compensation Act, an individual contractor cannot be considered an employee, and therefore, on his/ her death, the dependants cannot claim compensation, said the Kerala High Court.
The case pertained to a deceased electrician who supplied light and mike sets to small events and programmes. He was electrocuted at one such function that he was catering to, while connecting a mike set.
However, when his dependants submitted a claim for compensation to the respondents, the Employees Compensation Commissioner (Industrial Tribunal), Idukki dismissed the same as the said electrician was just an individual contractor and not an employee under Section 2(1) (dd) of the Employees Compensation Act.
The dependents of the deceased electrician, Babu, then went to the High Court challenging the order of the Compensation Commissioner that rejected their compensation claim.
However, Justice Pratheep Kumar also upheld the Commissioner’s order saying the rejection of the claim was justified. His argument was that the electrician was not an employee, but a contractor whose work was not controlled by the respondents. In fact, the electrician need not have done the work himself, since he had his own staff that could be ordered to do such work.
The applicants had argued that the Employees Compensation Act was supposed to be a social security and beneficial law that should be appropriately flexible and not refuse compensation to employees.
