Regular Second Appeal No. 1251 of 1986 1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Regular Second Appeal No. 1251 of 1986 Date of decision: 18.02.2010 The Cotton Corporation of India Ltd. ...appellant Versus Sh. Subhash Mittal ...respondent CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RANJIT SINGH Present: Mr. Vijay Pal, Advocate for Mr. Deepak Agnihotri, Advocate for the appellant. Mr. Munish Jolly, Advocate for the respondent. ***** RANJIT SINGH J. Respondent-plaintiff who was working as Assistant (General) in the Cotton Corporation of India Limited, Bombay (for short 'CCI') Branch office at Bathinda had filed the suit to challenge the action of the appellant to have wrongly fixed his pay in the scale as was settled in the Memorandum of Settlement. The facts in this case would disclose that Charter of demands was settled and signed by CCI with its wishes on 02.02.1984. The same was made effective w.e.f. 01.09.1982. The pay scale of the respondent-plaintiff was revised from 390-718 to 650-980. It was pleaded that pay was to be fixed in the revised scale in accordance with para 2(a) under the Head Method of fixation of Regular Second Appeal No. 1251 of 1986 2 pay as given in this para. As per the respondent-plaintiff his pay was to be fixed at Rs. 716/- per month but it was fixed at Rs. 694/-. This was stated to be contrary to the method of fixation of pay which led the respondent-plaintiff being deprived of the increment permanently. He made several representations and when nothing was done, he filed the suit for fixing his pay at Rs. 716/- per month instead of Rs. 694/- alongwith the consequential relief. The appellant raised number of preliminary objections. It was stated in the reply that respondent-plaintiff was estopped from filing the present suit besides stating that the Court had no jurisdiction and that the suit of declaration was not maintainable. On merit it was admitted that the salary of the plaintiff was fixed as per the agreement reached at the grade of Rs. 650-22-980. Other averments were also denied being incorrect. The trial Court framed the following issues:- 1. Whether the plaintiff is entitled to the relief claimed in view of agreement dated 2.2.1984 between the parties?OPP. 2. Whether the plaintiff has no locus standi to file the present suit?OPD. 3. Whether the plaintiff is estopped from filing the present suit by his own act and conduct?OPD. 4. Whether the suit for declaration is not maintainable?OPD. 5. What is effect of pending reference of the case of plaintiff with All India Cotton Corpn. Employees council?OPD. Regular Second Appeal No. 1251 of 1986 3 6. Whether this court has no jurisdiction to try the present suit?OPD. 7. Relief. The trial Court held the respondent-plaintiff entitled to pay of Rs. 716/- per month. The issue of locus standi was decided against the defendant. Issue No. 3 was also decided in favour of the plaintiff. Issues No. 5 and 6, one of which was regarding jurisdiction of the civil Court, was held in favour of the plaintiff and against the defendant and accordingly the relief was granted to the respondent- plaintiff. The appellant failed in appeal and so have now filed the Regular Second Appeal. The question of law which appears to have weighed with the Court while admitting this Regular Second Appeal was regarding the jurisdiction of civil Court to entertain the suit. It was urged that the dispute if any would come within the purview of Industrial Disputes Act. The issue has been properly dealt with and decided. The courts below had rightly noticed that there was no challenge to the Memorandum of Settlement, which was to govern the fixation of pay. It is only the wrong fixation of pay of the respondent-plaintiff that was under challenge and was gone into by the Court. As a matter of fact, it was held that the respondent-plaintiff was entitled to get his revised scale fixed at Rs. 716/- instead of Rs. 694/-. Wrong fixation of pay in terms of Memorandum of Settlement prima facie would not reveal any industrial dispute for which the respondent-plaintiff was required to seek reference under Section 10 of the Industrial Disputes Act. The issue was concerning Regular Second Appeal No. 1251 of 1986 4 the civil right of the respondent-plaintiff to get his pay fixed according to the Memorandum of Settlement. Once the representation filed by him was not decided, he could have agitated his grievance by filing a civil suit. It has rightly been viewed that fixation of pay involves civil right and could be adjudicated by filing the civil suit. Counsel for the appellant, however, has drawn my attention to the case of Manohar Lal versus State of Punjab Vol. LXXXV-1983 The Punjab Law Reporter 667, to urge that wherein alternative remedy or mode of redressal provided to a workman by claiming reference under Section 10 is available, this would be efficacious alternative remedy and ordinarily it would be a bar to the filing of a writ petition. Writ is the discretionary remedy and thus availability of alternative remedy is a self imposed bar imposed by the writ courts upon them to entertain writ petition. Availability of an alternative remedy to entitle a person to invoke the writ jurisdiction thus has to be viewed in different perspective. Right to file a civil suit to claim civil rights cannot be equated with writ jurisdiction. In any case, the counsel has not been able to show whether the wrong fixation of pay would also fall with the definition of industrial disputes, for which the reference could have been sought. No such plea appears from the record also. Accordingly, the question of law has rightly been decided by the courts below and call for no interference . The Regular Second Appeal is accordingly dismissed. February 18, 2010 ( RANJIT SINGH ) rts JUDGE