Gujarat: Honest restaurant fined Rs 25,000 for employing child

AHMEDABAD: A labour court slapped a penalty of Rs 25,000 on Honest restaurant for employing a child labourer. The famous food chain got away with relatively mild punishment after expressing remorse for committing the offence and promising that it would not commit this offence again.
According to case details, a labour officer, K M Rathwa, visited the restaurant at CG Road on March 8, 2018.He found a child labourer working at the eatery. He filed a complaint with the magisterial court against the restaurant for violation of Section 3 and Rule 5(1) of the Child Labour (Prevention and Regulation) Act. The offence is punishable. The court took cognizance of the offence under Section 204 of CrPC and issued summons to the restaurant.
Since the Gujarat high court has, through a notification, delegated powers to conduct a case for a criminal offence of this nature to the labour court, the case was taken up by a labour court on September 14, the day the Lok Adalat was organized.
Prashant Agrawal, the manager of Honest, appeared before the court and pleaded guilty, admitting that the restaurant had employed child labour. He urged the court to show leniency since it was their first offence. He expressed deep remorse for the offence and assured the court that the restaurant would never employ children younger than 14 as labourers in the future.
After hearing the restaurant manager, additional chief judicial magistrate of the labour court, D H Khambhati, said that instead of awarding a jail term, this was a fit case for a penalty. The court imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on the restaurant and directed it to pay the sum in 60 days.
On the occasion of the Lok Adalat, another eatery in Navrangpura, Naveen Chavana & Sweet Mart, took the opportunity to appear before the court and confess to the crime of employing children as labourers. It was also fined Rs 25,000 for the offence of child labour, in a 1997 case.
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