VAIKUNTAM ESTATE Vs. ARBITRATOR [RAMASWAMI T S ]

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this writ petition, filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the scope of the powers of en arbitrator, to whom the parties to an industrial dispute have made a voluntary reference under Section 10a. of the Industrial Disputes Act (14 of 1947) (hereinafter called the Act), comes in for consideration. The employer is the management of the Vaikun-tam Estate, Murthandam, in the Kanyakumari district, who is the petitioner in this writ petition. The arbitrator is Sri T. S. Ramaswami, respondent 1, and the workers of the Vaikuntam estate are represented by the secretary, Kumari Estate Workers' Union, Nagercoil, Kanyaknmari district, respondent 2. A number (42) of workers of the estate filed claim petitions under Section 33c (2) of the Act contending that they were permanent field workers in the estate which maintains a plantation, that they had been denied several benefits to which they were entitled under the provisions of the Plantations Labour Act, 1951, by the management, and that the right to these benefits should be determined and their quantum also determined. While these claim petitions were pending, the parties filed a joint memorandum agreeing to refer their disputes to arbitration, and the Joint memorandum mentioned that the point referred to the arbitration, was whether any or all of the 42 workers referred to in the list attached are to be treated as permanent labourers and whether they are eligible to get the benefits under the Plantations Labour Act, 1951.

(2.) BEFORE the arbitrator both the workers and the management elaborated their claims. A reference to the claim statement on behalf of the workers shows that they placed before the arbitrator for decision

(3.) THE arbitrator, however, in his award found