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3. The present appeals are concerned with this exemption provision as the three establishments in question claimed exemption in respect of application of this provision of the said Act.

4. The three appeals filed before us are by three limited companies (two separate legal entities and one, an establishment of the parent company), though the question of their exemption has been dealt with by a common order of the Regional Provident Fund Commissioner, Rajasthan (for short ‘RPFC’). This is so, as all the three establishments are sought to be denied exemption on the ground that they are effectively part of the same parent establishment, being M/s. Bennett, Coleman & Company Limited (for short ‘BCCL’), Mumbai. Civil Appeal No. 4475/2010 is by BCCL, Jaipur. We may note that the said Company is not a separate legal entity but was really claimed to be an establishment of the parent company, albeit set up in Jaipur. Civil Appeal No. 4476/2010 is by M/s. Times Publishing House Limited, Jaipur (for short ‘TPHL, Jaipur’) while Civil Appeal No. 4474/2010 is by M/s. Shree Vishal Printers Limited, Jaipur (for short ‘SVPL, Jaipur’).

14. BCCL, Mumbai was to pay to TPHL an amount calculated @ 5% as commissions on Net Advertisement Revenue and Net Circulation Revenue.

15. On all the three establishments being called upon to comply with the provisions of the said Act, all three of them sought exemption under Section 16(1)(d) of the said Act. In view thereof, the RPFC initiated proceedings under the said Act, and issued a notice under Section 7A of the said Act, dated 28.10.1987. The proceedings were held thereafter, and the RPFC passed a common order in respect of all the three establishments on 4.10.1990 opining that they were not entitled to the exemption. The appeal filed before the Employees’ Provident Fund Appellate Tribunal by all the three establishments also failed, as it was dismissed on 10.10.1997. The same fate befell all three in the proceedings before the learned Single Judge, vide order dated 20.12.2006 and the Division Bench of the High Court, on 11.4.2008. Thus, practically four forums have scrutinised the cases qua all these three establishments.

16. The learned senior counsel, Mr. Joydeep Gupta, appearing for TPHL, however, contended that the fallacy which came in the order of the RPFC was of jumbling of the facts in issue, relating to the three establishments, and thereafter, there has really been no scrutiny before any of the forums, other than giving their imprimatur to the said order. In fact, the High Court effectively refused to look into the matter as two forums had already gone into that aspect.

17. Learned senior counsel for the appellant, TPHL, sought to take us through the order of the RPFC, Rajasthan, as according to him, that was the material order to show that from the inception, there was a problem arising from the manner in which the facts relating to the three establishments were mixed up. He contended that each of these establishments were required to be connected to BCCL, Mumbai, and, it was not a case which could have been built on with connectivity with BCCL, Jaipur, as was sought to be done.

40. Despite the aforesaid, in the complete conspectus of facts, after divorcing different aspects of the three establishments, we are unable to come to a conclusion different from the one which we have come to for TPHL. We believe that the very nature of the working of SVPL and the other two entities show the functional integrality test to be satisfied.

They may be different legal entities, an arrangement may have been made to have different directors and shareholders, but the nature of control and integrality of functionality, between the three entities is quite apparent from the facts set out hereinabove. Each one of the facts by itself may not be conclusive, but taken as a whole, there can be no other conclusion, than the one arrived at by the RPFC. We are doing so, quite conscious of the fact that there is undoubtedly some jumbling which has arisen in the order of the RPFC, which has been affirmed throughout. But then, the case of the appellants was built on the principle that all these three entities have really no functional integrality vis-à-vis BCCL, Mumbai. As it emerged subsequently, and was conceded before us; there is little doubt that BCCL, Jaipur is a unit of BCCL, Mumbai, and the other two units have linkages and are controlled by BCCL, Jaipur in a manner which would satisfy the functional integrality test.