KUMARESAN N Vs. P O LABOUR COURT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By these two writ petitions, the management and the workman seek to quash the award of the first respondent-Labour Court, dated April 23, 1993, passed in I.D. No. 433 of 1990.

(2.) The management is aggrieved against the said award of the Labour Court inasmuch as the first respondent having held that the termination order, exhibit M-39, issued by the management was justified it was not open for the first respondent to grant any relief in the form of payment of ex gratia amount of Rs. 25,000 to the workman. The workman is aggrieved against the said award inasmuch as the first respondent has held that the termination order issued under exhibit M-39, was justified and that the workman was only entitled for ex-gratia of Rs. 25,000. The workman is also aggrieved against the other finding of the first-respondent holding that the employee does not fall within the definition of "workman" as defined under Section 2(s) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947. W.P. No. 12374 of 1994 has been preferred by the employee, while the other writ petition, viz., W.P. No. 15898 of 1994, has been preferred by the management against the very same award.

(3.) Learned counsel for the petitioner-workman in W.P. No. 12374 of 1994 raised the following contentions, namely, that the order passed in the appeal preferred by the workman under the Tamil Nadu Shops and Establishments Act, 1947, against the order of termination, cannot stand in the way of the petitioner raising an industrial dispute, challenging the very same order of termination, even though the appeal preferred under the Tamil Nadu Shops and Establishments Act was rejected on the ground of delay in preferring the appeal. Secondly, learned counsel contended that the finding of the first respondent-Labour Court that the petitioner was not a "workman" under Section 2(s) of, the Industrial Disputes Act was wholly illegal and was not based on proper acceptable evidence. Thirdly, learned counsel for the petitioner would submit that the allegation of continued ill-health, based on which the order of termination was issued, was wholly unjustified. Lastly, he contended that the petitioner's involvement in certain business ventures carried on by his wife and mother, cannot be a ground for the first respondent to grant a lesser relief than what he was entitled to in the facts and circumstances of the case.