JAYAKUMAR B. Vs. DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT OF POLICE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioners claim to be partners and are before this Court seeking protection to carry on loading and unloading work in their vegetable shop named A S A Vegetables. It is the contention of the petitioners that they are small scale entrepreneurs who has taken on rent a premise from one Mr. P.H Ansalam @ George and are carrying on the loading and unloading work of vegetables brought from inside and outside the State, by themselves, without engaging any workers. Admittedly, the said area is a covered area and respondents 3 to 5 are unions under the additional 6th respondent Board, whose members are allegedly causing obstruction to the business of the petitioners claiming loading and unloading work which they are not entitled to as long as the owners carry on the same by themselves.

(2.) THE respondents 3 to 5 and the Board have filed counter affidavit contending that in fact the petitioners have no independent business and the business said to be run by the petitioners is also owned by the said George and petitioners have been set up by the said person so as to deny the loading and unloading work to the members of the respondent Union. The Board as well as respondents 3 to 5 asserted that they have been carrying on the work of loading and unloading in the business place of the said George and the partnership of the petitioners is a sham and it is only a ruse to deny the work to the members of the respondent unions. The Additional Sub Inspector of Police has also filed a counter affidavit wherein the ownership of two rooms by the said George and the conduct of business in both of these rooms is reported. One is by the said George and the other by the petitioners. It is also the submission of the Additional Sub Inspector that there is no law and order situation as of now and that the dispute is purely a labour dispute.

(3.) THE said interim order has also been extended thereafter. Despite the assertion of the respondent unions that the business carried on by the petitioners' firm is also owned by the landlord of the room, one cannot assume so, without anything further. In any event, the petitioners, who claim to be small scale entrepreneurs, are only concerned with the loading and unloading of the work in their establishment namely, A S A Vegetables carried on in the room specified in the writ petition and extracted in the aforementioned interim order. Considering the claim that the partners, three in number, the petitioners themselves, are carrying on the loading and unloading work, we are of the opinion that there can be no obstruction of such loading and unloading work which, order is confined to the establishment named ASA Vegetables.