Case: Delhi Cloth and General Mills Company Limited Vs. Ganesh Dutt and Others

also very severely cross-examined them. Therefore, the view of the Industrial Tribunal that full particulars have not been given in the reports and, therefore, the enquiry proceedings are vitiated, is also equally erroneous.29. It must be stated that the charge-sheets clearly show the nature of the allegations made against the workmen and their explanations also shown that they understood very well the nature of the allegations that they had to meet. In fact, even the cross-examination made by some of the workmen, of the witnesses, clearly shows that they were attempting to establish that no such incident took place as spoken to by the witnesses. No doubt, this attempt miserably failed.30. In view of what is stated above, it follows that the approach made by the Special Industrial Tribunal in refusing permission is absolutely erroneous. In fact, a reading of the order gives an impression that it was constituting itself as an authority sitting in appeal over the proceedings conducted by the enquiry officer. The nature of the jurisdiction exercised by an Industrial Tribunal in such circumstances is a very limited one and it has been laid down by several decisions of this Court. The legal position is that where a proper enquiry has been held by the management, the Tribunal has to accept the finding arrived at in that enquiry unless it is perverse or unreasonable and should give the permission asked for unless it has reason to believe that the management is guilty of victimisation or has been guilty of unfair labour practice or is acting mala fide : (vide The Punjab National Bank Ltd. v. Its Workmen, [1959 - II L.L.J. 666]; (1960) 1 S.C.R. 806, Bharat Sugar Mills Ltd. v. Jai Singh, [1961 - II L.L.J. 644], Management of Ritz Theatre (P.) Ltd. v. Its Workmen, [1962 - II L.L.J. 498]; (1963) 3 S.C.R. 461, and Mysore Steel Works v. Jitendra Chandra Kar & others, [1971 - I L.L.J. 543]).31. Mr. Sharma refereed us to paragraph 40 of the certified standing orders of the appellant-company Ex. M. 4 to the effect that in the order deciding to dismiss the workmen, the appellant-company has not taken into account, as it is bound to, the previous record, if any, of the workmen. This contention cannot be accepted because in the order dated May 9, 1966, communicated to each of the workmen, in the penultimate paragraph it has been stated that while arriving at the decision to dismiss the employees from the service for misconduct, all relevant circumstances, including the past record of service, have been fully taken into consideration. So far as we could see, no challenge has been made by the workmen that the appellant has not taken into account his past record.32. Before we conclude we must refer to one other contention raised by Mr. Sharma, learned counsel for the respondents. He pointed out that the order dated May 9, 1966 passed by the company clearly shows that the workman concerned was suspended without wages with immediate effect pending permission of the Industrial Tribunal for dismissing the workman. This, he pointed out, is illegal as by suspending the workman, the management has imposed a punishment, which it could not do under S. 33(1)(b) without obtaining previous permission of the Industrial Tribunal. Therefore, according to Mr. Sharma, there has been a violation of S. 33(1)(b) of the Act and hence the said order is illegal and void.33. Mr. Sharma quite fairly conceded that the above contention has not been raised before the Industrial Tribunal. If the appellant-company had contravened the provisions of S. 33(1)(b) of the Act, during the pendency of the proceedings before the Industrial Tribunal, the employee aggrieved by such contravention is entitled to make a complaint under S.33A of the Act. Even otherwise such a contention has been rejected by this Court in The Management of Hotel Imperial, New Delhi and others v. Hotel Workers Union, [1959 - II L.L.J. 544]; (1960) 1 S.C.R. 476, as follows :"We are, therefore, of opinion that the ordinary law of master and servant as to suspension can be and should be held to have been modified in view of the fundamental change introduced by S. 33 in that law and a term should be implied by Industrial Tribunals in the contract of employment that if the master has held proper enquiry and come to the conclusion that the servant should be dismissed and in consequence suspends him pending the permission required under S. 33, he has the power to order such suspension, thus suspending the contract of employment temporarily, so that there is no obligation on him to pay wages and no obligation on the servant to work. In dealing with this point the basic and decisive consideration introduced by S. 33 must be borne in mind. The undisputed common law right of the master to dismiss his servant by proper cause has been subjected by S. 33 to a ban and that in fairness must mean that, pending the removal of the said statutory ban, the master can after holding a proper enquiry temporarily terminate the relationship of master and servant by suspending his employee pending proceedings under S. 33. It follows therefore, that if the Tribunal grants permission, the suspended contract would come to an end and there will be no further obligation to pay any wages after the date of suspension.If, on the other hand, the permission is refused, the suspension would be wrong and the workman would be entitled to all his wages from the date of suspension."Therefore, the contention of Mr. Sharma that the order is bad in view of the fact that the workman has been suspended without the previous permission of the Tribunal, on the basis of the above ruling, has to be rejected.34. For all the reasons given above, the order of the Special Industrial Tribunal is set aside and the application filed by the appellant-company No. 24 of 1966, before the Industrial Tribunal, is ordered as prayed for.

Decision (1 = appeal accepted, 0 = rejected): 1

Explanation:
1[ds]15. In view of the fact that we are accepting the first contention of Mr. Anand, that the enquiry proceedings are not vitiated by any of the circumstances pointed out by the Tribunal, we do not think it necessary to deal with the second contention of the learned counsel.16. So far as the first contention is concerned, the Industrial Tribunal has held that the domestic enquiry conducted by the management not valid in view of the following circumstances : (1) That the copies of the reports sent by the three employees in the spinning A department Exs. M. 32 to M. 34 were not furnished to the workmen at any stage either before the commencement of the enquiry or even during the course of the enquiry; (2) The appellant did not furnish the workmen a list of witnesses, whom it proposed to examine in the domestic enquiry; (3) The workmen, whose misconduct was being enquired into wereon the side of the management; and (4) The reports Exs. M. 32 to M. 34 did not give full and complete details regarding the part played by the workmen concerned. We can deal with all the circumstances given by the Tribunal together.17. We have gone through the enquiry proceedings as well as the report of the enquiry officer. The enquiry proceedings commenced on April 1, 1966. There is no controversy that the workmen concerned were present before the enquiry officer throughout the enquiry proceedings. In fact it is seen that there was one Babu Ram Mishra, representing two workmen namely, Rati Ram and Hari Chand on April 1, 1966. But Babu Ram Mishra represented only Rati Ram from the next day. From April 2, 1966 onwards, Hari Chand conducted his own defence. The other two workmen Ganesh Dutt and Bhoop Singh represented that they did not want to bring anyone to represent them it the enquiry proceedings and that they would themselves defend their cases. The charges as well as the explanations furnished by the workmen were read over to them by the enquiry officer and the workmen pleaded not guilty. Babu Ram Mishra, who was representing some of the workmen in the enquiry proceeding requested the enquiry officer that the evidence, on the basis of whichwere issued may be furnished to the workmen. This request was reiterated by the other workmen also. The enquiry officer directed copies of such evidence to be furnished to the workmen by 2.30 p.m. that day in order to enable the workmen to prepare their defence. The proceedings were adjourned to the next day, i.e. April 2, 1966. Before 2.30 P.M. on April 1, 1966, copies of the reports Exs. M. 32 to M. 34 were furnished to the workmen and there is a further endorsement by the enquiry officer that the enquiry proceedings are adjourned to the next day, i.e., April 2, 1966 and that copies of the reports have been furnished to the workmen. All the workmen have signed the endorsement in token of having received the copies of the reports, as well as about the proceedings being adjourned to the next day.We are not inclined to accept this contention of Mr. Sharma, learned counsel for the respondents. There can be no controversy that the three persons who made the reports Exs. M. 32 to M. 34 had given evidence in full in the presence of workmen before the enquiry officer and they were alsoat length by some of the workmen themselves or by Babu Ram Mishra, on behalf of Rati Ram.22. There is no indication that Hari Chand andine because of the fact that the copies of the reports had been supplied to them only on the date of the enquiry. If they had any real grievance in that regard, they could have very well made a request to the enquiry officer for grant of time. Admittedly, they did not make any such request. Even apart from this, it is clear that the entire evidence has been given by the witnesses in the presence of the workmen and the latter knew full well the nature of the evidence that was being given against them and they had sufficient opportunity tothe witnesses, if they chose. Therefore,of the copies of the reports along with thehas never been made a grievance by any of the workmen, when the enquiry proceedings were being conducted.The Tribunal is also in error in holding that because the workmen werethe enquiry proceedings are vitiated. When the workmen have examined witnesses on their behalf and gave their statements, there is no prohibition in law for the companythe workmen concerned regarding the statements made by them.27. A perusal of the enquiry proceedings clearly shows that the company has only asked them questions regarding some of the matters referred to by the workmen in their statements. We were referred to the decisions of this Court in Associated Cement Co. Ltd. v. Their Workmen and another, [1963II L.L.J. 396]; (1964) 3 S.C.R. 652, Central Bank of India Ltd. v. Karunamoy Banerjee, [1967II L.L.J. 739]; (1968) 1 S.C.R. 251, and Employers of Firestone Tyre and Rubber Co. Ltd. v. Their Workmen [1967II L.L.J. 715]; (1968) 1 S.C.R. 307, as laying down the proposition that the workman against whom an enquiry for misconduct is being conducted, cannot beWe are satisfied that none of the decisions referred to above, lay down any such proposition.It must be stated that theclearly show the nature of the allegations made against the workmen and their explanations also shown that they understood very well the nature of the allegations that they had to meet. In fact, even themade by some of the workmen, of the witnesses, clearly shows that they were attempting to establish that no such incident took place as spoken to by the witnesses. No doubt, this attempt miserablylegal position is that where a proper enquiry has been held by the management, the Tribunal has to accept the finding arrived at in that enquiry unless it is perverse or unreasonable and should give the permission asked for unless it has reason to believe that the management is guilty of victimisation or has been guilty of unfair labour practice or is acting mala fide : (vide The Punjab National Bank Ltd. v. Its Workmen, [1959II L.L.J. 666]; (1960) 1 S.C.R. 806, Bharat Sugar Mills Ltd. v. Jai Singh, [1961II L.L.J. 644], Management of Ritz Theatre (P.) Ltd. v. Its Workmen, [1962II L.L.J. 498]; (1963) 3 S.C.R. 461, and Mysore Steel Works v. Jitendra Chandra Kar & others, [1971is contention cannot be accepted because in the order dated May 9, 1966, communicated to each of the workmen, in the penultimate paragraph it has been stated that while arriving at the decision to dismiss the employees from the service for misconduct, all relevant circumstances, including the past record of service, have been fully taken into consideration. So far as we could see, no challenge has been made by the workmen that the appellant has not taken into account his pastthe contention of Mr. Sharma that the order is bad in view of the fact that the workman has been suspended without the previous permission of the Tribunal, on the basis of the above ruling, has to be rejected.34. For all the reasons given above, the order of the Special Industrial Tribunal is set aside and the application filed by theNo. 24 of 1966, before the Industrial Tribunal, is ordered as prayed for.