R K PANDA Vs. STEEL AUTHORITY OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Writ Petition (C) No. 617 of 1986 was filed on the allegation that the petitioners were continuing in employment for periods ranging from 10 to 20 years under different contractors and they are contract labourers. The contractors, though used to be changed, had to employ the workers of the predecessor contractors subject to the requirement of the job being a condition of the term of the contract and they were discharging jobs which are perennial in nature and identical to the jobs which are being done by the regular employees of the respondent. Therefore, it was urged that they were entitled to be paid the same wages as regular employees and ought to be treated similarly. It was only to defeat their claims and other labourers similarly situated that they were being designated as 'contract labourers.' These matters examined by this Court at length and by an order made on May 12, 1994 the Court directed absorption in the employment of the respondent of labourers who have been initially engaged through contractors but have been continuously working with the respondent for the last 10 years on different jobs assigned to them in spite of replacement or change of contractors subject to their being found medically fit and they are below 58 years of age with certain other incidental reliefs. It was made clear that this direction shall be operated only in respect of 142 jobs out of 246 jobs in view of the fact that contract labour for 104 jobs had been abolished. In the course of the said order this Court also noticed that normally it would not exercise its jurisdiction under Article 32 or Article 136 of the Constitution, but relegate the parties to remedies available under Industrial Disputes Act. However, certain extraordinary circumstances were noticed by this Court and, therefore, the aforesaid relief was granted. The aforesaid directions were given after noticing that contract labourers had been employed in 246 jobs in the steel plant, out of which 104 jobs have been identified in which contract labour has been abolished, while in 142 jobs the contract labour is still continuing and the contract labourers who might have ceased to be working with the respondent are continuing by different interim orders of the Court and in respect of such employees an order was made by the Court on 6-8-1992 to the following effect:-

(2.) Now in these proceedings an application is made to the Court by 104 workmen seeking a direction to take them back in regular employment with effect from 1-10-1992 or 1-4-1993 that is, the date from which other workmen were regularised pursuant to the order made on 6-8-1992 or on 31-12-1994. The applicants allege that:

(3.) Their claim is that they are workmen in notified jobs Nos. 79, 80, 81 and 103 of the notification abolishing the contract labour issued on 30-3-1989 and amended on 17-12-1998. In the notification dated 30-3-1989 jobs at serial Nos. 79, 80 and 81 were showed to be "Cleaning" and serial No. 103 "Survey Work." On the basis of the report made by the Deputy Labour Commissioner that there are no such jobs in existence during the relevant time of the issuance of the Government notification issued under Section 10(1) of the Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970, an amendment was made by a notification issued on May 9, 1995 modifying the description of jobs as aforesaid. Thereafter on December 17, 1998 yet another notification was issued to the same effect pursuant to a report made by the State Advisory Contract Labour Board.