C.W.P. No.11612 of 1995 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT FOR THE STATES OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH C.W.P. No.11612 of 1995 Date of Decision: 06.11.2009 Raj Kumar .....Petitioner Versus The Presiding Officer, Labour Court, U.T., Chandigarh and others ....Respondents Present: Mr. N.K. Nagar, Advocate for the petitioner. Ms. Monica Chhibbar Sharma, Advocate DAG Punjab. CORAM:HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN 1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? Yes 2. To be referred to the Reporters or not ? Yes 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? Yes -.- K. KANNAN J.(ORAL) 1. The workman's reference obtained from the Government was for an adjudication before the Labour Court whether the termination of service on 29.12.1989 was valid or not. The workman was claiming reinstatement on the ground that it was an illegal termination. His contention was that he was working continuously from 01.11.1988 till 14.06.1989 at Chandigarh and later, transferred to Batala. He was working as a Washing Boy and he was retransferred to Chandigarh on 30.09.1989 where he worked till his ultimate termination on 29.12.1989. 2. The contention of the respondent, who was the General C.W.P. No.11612 of 1995 -2- Manager, Punjab Roadways, was that a Washing Boy's job was not a transferable job and during the period that he was working from 01.11.1988 to December, 1989, the attendance register showed that he had worked only for 207 days. The workman did not deny the contention that he had worked only for 207 days at Chandigarh but he was seeking to compute the days which he was working at Batala also as constituting a single service to enable him to contend that he had continuous service of 240 days and to claim that the termination was in violation of Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act. 3. The Assistant Store Keeper, Jagjit Singh was examined as MW-1 who brought the attendance register and had also given evidence to the effect that the General Manager was the appointing authority for a Washing Boy and that it was not a transferable job. It was the contention that the petitioner had not been transferred to any other depot and the workman had not made even to the General Manager of the Batala Division of the Punjab Roadways to contend that his term of employment at Batala could also be tacked on for his work at Chandigarh. It has been laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in HUDA Vs. Om Pal (2007) 5 SCC 742 where the Hon'ble Supreme Court has held that the mere fact that controlling authority is the same person when the workman is employed in two different divisions cannot be counted as a single service. The test will be whether it was C.W.P. No.11612 of 1995 -3- possible for a divisional head to transfer a person from one division to yet another division or if the order of the transfer itself had been made by the head of the organisation from one division to another, it could still be seen whether it constituted a single service or not. In the face of express denial by the Punjab Roadways that the post of Washing Boy was not a transferable one and that his alleged engagement on daily basis in Batala was not in any way connected with his work at Chandigarh, it will have to be concluded that the workman had not proved his continuous service of 240 days, which is the basis for a complaint of violation of Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act. The Labour Court has upheld the contention of management only in the context of the workman's failure to prove the alleged continuity of his engagement from Chandigarh to Batala and back again to Chandigarh. The evidence of the management was clearly contrary to the contention of the workman and the Labour Court was under the circumstances justified that the workman could have no relief before the Labour Court and there existed no violation of any statutory provision. 4. The writ petition is, under the circumstances, dismissed. There shall be, however, no direction as to costs. (K. KANNAN) JUDGE November 06, 2009 Pankaj* C.W.P. No.11612 of 1995 -4-