Case: Employers In Relation To Digwadih Colliery Vs. Their Workmen

1. This is an appeal by special leave against the Award, dated August 3, 1962 of the Central Government Industrial Tribunal, Dhanbad, underthe Industrial Disputes Act, 1947. The appellants are the Employers in relation to Digwadih Colliery and the respondents their workmen. The workmen did not appear in this Court. The dispute was whether the management of the colliery was justified in terminating the services of Jaldhar Singh with back wages.      2. Jaldhar Singh was a badli workman which means (as defined by the Standing Orders of the colliery) a person appointed in the post of a permanent employee or probationer who is temporarily absent. He worked as badli in the calendar years 1959 and 1960 in different capacities. His employment was, of course, not continuous and there were six breaks of one day to a seek in 1959 and eight breaks of one day to a week in 1960. However, he worked for more than 240 days in each calendar year though with these interruptions. In January 1961 the colliery terminated Jaldhar Singhs services without notice to him on payment of wages in lieu of notice or compensations. A dispute arising conciliation was attempted but failed and the reference followed.      3. Before the Tribunal the workmen claimed that Jaldhar Singh was a permanent workman while the Employers contended that he was temporary. The Employers stated that as some of the permanent staff had become surplus, there was no need of badli workmen and the termination of Jaldhar Singhs service was justified. The workmen attempted to prove that Jaldhar Singh was permanent from 1960 and produced some documents from which they asked that this inference be drawn but the Tribunal did not agree. The workmen relied in the alternative upon S. 25F of the Act because Jaldhar Singh had put in service of 240 days in each of the years and contended that as the Employers had failed to comply with the provisions of S. 25F the termination of service was illegal and unjustified. The Employers submitted that S. 25F could apply only if Jaldhar Singh had put in 240 days continuous service in any of the year 1959 or 1960.

Court's reasoning:
6. Mr. B. Sen drew our attention to the Industrial Disputes (Amendment) Act, 1964 which was passed last December. By S. 2 (iii) of the amending Act of 1964, cl. (eee) of the second section of the principal Act was omitted and by S. 13, for S. 25B in the principal Act the following was substituted:"25B. For the purposes of this Chapter,(1) a workman shall be said to be in continuous service for a period if he is, for that period, i uninterrupted service, including service which may be interrupted on account of sickness or authorised leave on an accident or a strike which is not legal, or a lock out or a cessation of work which is not due to any fault on the part of the workman;(2) where a workman is not in continuous service within the meaning of clause (1) for a period of one year * * * *, he shall be deemed to be in continuous service under an employer(a) for a period of one year, if the workman, during a period of twelve calendar months preceding the date with reference to which calculation is to be made, has actually worked under the employer for not less than(i) one hundred and ninety days in the case of a workman employed below ground in a mine; and(ii) two hundred and forty days, in any other cases;* * * *The Explanation to S. 25B is the same, mutatis mutandis as before. Mr. Sen contended that the change in the law brought out his contention. We do not agree. The amended S. 25B only consolidates the previous Ss. 25B and 2 (eee) in one place, adding some other matters which are not relevant to the present purpose, but the purport of the new provisions is not different. In fact the amendment of S. 25F of the principal Act by substituting in cl. (b) the words "for every completed year of continuous service" for the words "for every completed year of service" now removes a discordance between the unamended S. 25B and the unamended cl. (b) of S. 25F. Neither before these several changes nor after these is uninterrupted service necessary if the total service is 240 days in a period of twelve calendar months. The only change in the new Act is that this service must be during a period of twelve calendar months preceding the date with reference to which calculation is to be made. The last amendment now removes a vagueness which existed in the unamended S.25B.