IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.13309 of 2000 Date of decision:31.08.2009 Rameshwar Singh ...Petitioner versus District Education Officer, Rohtak and others ...Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K.KANNAN Present: Mr. Rajdeep Singh Tacoria, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. D.S.Nalwa, Additional Advocate General, Haryana. ---- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? ---- K.Kannan, J.(Oral) 1. The award that is challenged is one of rejection by the Labour Court of the workman’s contentions that he had been unlawfully terminated on 31.07.1994. The contention of the workman was that he had been in service as a Water Carrier in a school from 27.11.1991 and held his work without any interruption till 31.07.1994. The workman had relied on an order dated 26.11.1991 when he had been appointed as a workman and the details of the appointment order stipulated that the salary would be sanctioned by the Deputy Commissioner, Rohtak and that the appointment was purely temporary. 2. It appears that on 16.11.1992, an order again issued by the SDEO referring to the fact that he shall be continued in employment and Civil Writ Petition No.13309 of 2000 - 2 - that it shall subject to sanction from the DEO. The learned counsel appearing for the workman would contend that sanction had been obtained and that he was continued in employment and he was being paid the wages upto 28.02.1994. Subsequently the wages were not being paid but he continued in work till 31.07.1994, when yet another person was appointed on compassionate grounds on 23.07.1994. 3. The Labour Court, while rejecting the reference, held that the workman had been appointed on ad hoc basis on 16.11.1992 by Shri S.N.Sharma, who was merely a Teacher and was merely officiating as DDO. He himself did not have the competence and therefore, it was, that the sanction had to be obtained from the DDO. The Labour Court held that when a fresh appointment was done in favour of Kuldip Singh, who was a compassionate appointee, the workman could not have continued and the termination under such a situation, was perfectly justified. The Court also held that the termination itself would not amount to retrenchment in view of the provisions of clause (bb) of Section 2 (oo) of the Industrial Disputes Act. 4. Referring to the provisions of Section 2(oo)(bb) of the Act, the learned counsel appearing for the workman would submit that the engagement was not for any particular period under the contract and all that was expressed in the first letter of appointment on 26.11.1991 as well as on 16.11.1992 were that the post was temporary. The subsequent letter dated 16.11.1992 merely stated that it was subject to an approval and such approval had also been granted and enured till February, 1994. 5. The learned counsel appearing for the workman refers to a Civil Writ Petition No.13309 of 2000 - 3 - decision of the Division Bench of this Court in Bhikku Ram Versus The Presiding Officer, Industrial Tribunal-cum-Labour Court, Rohtak- 1998(1) RSJ 703, where dealing with Section 2(oo)(bb) the Hon'ble Division Bench of this Court held that an action of an employer to engage a workman on casual basis or on a daily wages or even on temporary basis for long periods of time with intermittent breaks and subsequent termination of service of such workman on the pretext of non-renewal of contract of employment or termination of contract of employment on the basis of a stipulation contained therein would amount to act of unfair labour practice and such an action of the employer will have to be nullified. The Bench was upholding the order of the Labour Court rejecting the plea of the employer that the termination of the service was covered under clause 2(oo)(bb). 6. The learned counsel Mr.Nalwa appearing on behalf of the State, would contend that there is no plea for the workman that there had been any unfair labour practice that was applied against the workman. It was simply a case where there were only three posts available in the school and as regards the post of a Water Carrier, there had been a permanent employment order issued on compassionate basis to another workman. The learned counsel appearing for the workman however points out that such a plea though not taken in the Court below, such an evidence had been brought before the Labour Court and the decision itself has been rendered only such a basis. After all, the Labour Court was also bound to say whether a plea of reinstatement was possible and whether there exists a post which he could have occupied. There was Civil Writ Petition No.13309 of 2000 - 4 - certainly a job to be done till a permanent appointee had replaced him. The terms of engagement did not itself stipulate that he was being engaged till a regular appointment was to be made. I hold therefore the termination was not attracted to the provisions of Section 2(oo)(bb). There was however justification for his removal and it could have been validly done only by resort to the procedure under Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act. For non-compliance of the statutory mandate, the workman was entitled to be compensated, which in my view, shall be Rs.50,000/-. The amount shall be paid by the management within a period of six weeks, failing which the amount shall bear 9% interest per annum. 7. The award of the Labour Court, under the circumstances, shall stand modified to the extent of providing for compensation and the writ petition shall stand allowed to that extent. No costs. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 31.08.2009 sanjeev