Social Justice & Industrial Laws

Social Justice & Industrial Laws

Social Justice & Industrial Laws

The Preamble of the Constitution highlights the concept of socio-economic justice, being the main objectives of the State required by the Constitution. 

Article 38 of the Constitution provides the concept of social justice by providing that the State shall strive to promote the welfare of the people by securing and protecting, as effectively as it may, social order in which justice, social, economic and political shall inform all institutions of the national life.

Further, Article 39 says that it shall be the duty of the state to apply certain principles of social justice in making laws. 

“The concept social and economic justice is a living concept of revolutionary import, it gives sustenance to the rule of law, meaning and significance to the ideal of the welfare state.” 

(Justice Gajendragadkar in the State of Mysore v. Workers of Gold Mines, AIR 1958 SC 923). 

In the economic sphere, social justice means opportunities in greater measure to the poor and the needy for the betterment of their social and economic conditions.

“It does not mean making rich man poor in order to make poor men rich. It does not mean that all wealth should be shared equally provision of basic mimimum to all in response to life and living facilities for promoting one’s own values and manner worth are the essential contents of social justice.”

(K.N. Bhattacharya, Indian Plans, A Generalist Approach, (1963) p. 97). 

It is the responsibility of both the State and the citizens to work hand in hand for achieving social justice.

“The State has constitutional responsibilities and the citizens have moral responsibility and the combination of the two types of responsibilities tend to create an ideal society worthy to live in”.

(Chakradhar Jha, ‘Judicial Review of Legislative Acts’ (1974).