MANOMANI S Vs. LABOUR COURT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner has brought this O.P. seeking to quash an order Ext. P-7 passed by the Labour Court, Quilon, dismissing a claim petition No. 467/66 filed by him under S.33C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 on the ground that the Labour Court was not competent to adjudicate on the matter under S.33C(2) of the said Act.

(2.) A few facts have to be stated for the purpose of appreciating the contentions raised on behalf of the petitioner. The petitioner was employed in the State Transport Department of the Government of Kerala as a watcher. He was dismissed from service by an order dated 14-3-1962 apparently on grounds of misconduct. Subsequently, however, the punishment of dismissal was set aside and the petitioner was reinstated in service by order dated 10-1-1963 imposing on him a much lesser punishment of withholding of his increment for one year. On 13-7-1964, the petitioner filed an application under S.33C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act before the Labour Court, Quilon, claiming that he was entitled by way of "benefit" legitimately due to him to the arrears of salary and allowances for the period during which he was wrongfully kept out of office by virtue of the order of dismissal wrongfully passed against him and praying that the respondent should be directed to pay such amount to the petitioner by an order passed under sub-s.(4). On the date of presentation of the claim petition, S.33C(2) was in the following terms:

(3.) The Director of Transport, Trivandrum, the respondent in the petition before the Labour Court, raised a preliminary contention that the claim made by the petitioner was not one which could be made the subject matter of a petition under S.33C(2) and could not, therefore, be validly adjudicated upon by the Labour Court under the said section. It was urged that the salary and allowances for the period during which the petitioner had been kept out of service would not fall within the scope of the expression "benefit" occurring in S.33C(2) of the Act, and that if the petitioner really had any grievance arising out of the withholding of such amounts, the proper course open to him, if he wanted to take recourse to the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act, was only to raise a dispute under S.10 of the Act. It was also contended on the merits that no amount was actually due to the petitioner since, as an integral part of the very proceedings by which he was reinstated in service, orders had been issued by the department under R.56 of the Kerala Service Rules directing the period of his absence from duty to be treated as eligible leave, in consequence whereof all that the petitioner was entitled to receive was the salary due to him in respect of a period of seven days amounting to Rs. 18.20, which sum had been duly tendered to him by the department.