1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY NAGPUR BENCH, NAGPUR. LETTERS PATENT APPEAL NO. 322 OF 2008 IN WRIT PETITION NO. 3316 OF 2000 (Superintending Engineer and another .v. Member, Industrial Court and others) Office Notes, Office Memoranda of Coram appearances, Court's orders or directions Court's or Judge's Orders and Registrar's orders. Shri J.T. Gilda, Advocate for the asppellants. Shri S.B. Ahirkar, AGP for the respondent Nos.1 and 3. Shri S.A. Kalbande, Advocate for the respondent No.2. CORAM : D.K. DESHMUKH AND PRASANNA B. VARALE, JJ. 27TH NOVEMBER, 2008 Heard. This is an appeal filed by the employer challenging the order dated 08.08.2008 passed by the learned Single Judge of this Court who has rejected the petition against the order of Industrial Court. The Industrial Court has held that as the respondent No.2 was engaged as Mukadam for number of years i.e. from the year 1979, he is entitled to be brought on Converted Regular Temporary Employee (CRTE) from 25.08.1990. Before the learned Single Judge, the entitlement of the respondent No.2 to be brought on CRTE was not challenged. What was challenged is that the respondent No.2 has not pleaded in his complaint 2 that he is a workman within the meaning of MRTU and PULP Act and, therefore, according to the appellants his complaint could not have been entertained by the learned Industrial Court. It is an admitted position that such a contention that he has not pleaded that he is a workman and, therefore, his complaint cannot be entertained, was not raised in reply that was filed before the Industrial Court. The learned Counsel for the appellants relying on the judgment of the learned Single Judge of this Court in the case of State of Maharashtra and others .v. Presiding Officer and others (reported in 2006(5) Mh.L.J., 838) contends that such a contention can be permitted to be raised for the first time in a petition filed before the High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. We have gone through the said judgment. In our opinion, what has been observed in the said judgment cannot be said to be correct, because if the objection is raised about lack of necessary pleadings before the labour Court, the complainant could have amended his complaint. The appellants by not raising such contention before the labour Court has caused prejudice to the complainant. Had it been the case of 3 the employer that the applicant is not a workman , an objection to the maintainability of the complaint would have been raised. The conduct of the employer of not raising such a contention shows that the employer accepted the position that the complaint is maintainable. What is pertinent to be noted is that it is not the submission of the employer that the applicant before the Industrial Court is not a workman. The objection is that he did not plead that he is a workman. The Industrial Court is a special Court which gets jurisdiction to resolve dispute between workman and employer. Therefore, if according to the respondent, the complaint is not maintainable before the Court because the relationship of employer and workman does not exist, he will have to raise an objection to the maintainability of the complaint. Hence, in our opinion, no interference is called for in the order impugned. LPA is rejected. JUDGE JUDGE *rrg.