MANAGEMENT OF BRAKES INDIA LTD. Vs. PRESIDING OFFICER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The Award of the Labour Court dated 09.09.2015 passed in I.D.No.94 of 1981, is sought to be quashed and a consequential direction is also sought for to pay a lump sum amount of Rs.10 lakhs to the second respondent-workman by the writ petitioner-Company as compensation in lieu of reinstatement with minor punishment.

(2.) The writ petitioner-Establishment is the manufacturer of Automobile parts. The writ petitioner-Company states that the second respondent-workman along with two other office bearers of Brakes India Employees Union, P.Selvaraj and P.V.Madhavan, challenged the leadership of S.M.Narayanan and prevented him from conducting Union Elections during April 1977. Thereafter, intra Union rivalry intensified between these two group of office bearers. As a consequence, the second respondent, P.Selvaraj and P.V.Madhavan with a view to upstage Mr.S.M.Narayanan and Mr.N.Devarajan, instigated the workmen to indulge in stoppage of work, insubordination, disorderly behaviour, loitering, holding demonstration etc., all being done during normal working hours of the factory in both the shifts. This was intensified as a stay in strike from 13.07.1977 to 13.08.1977. On 13.08.1977, an accord was reached before the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and work resumed in factory on 19.08.1977 after 33 days of illegal and unjustified strike. In terms of the above accord, two workmen Mr.C.S.Neelakandan and Mr.P.Selvaraj were nominated as the authorised representatives of the whole body of workmen of the factory, pending the question of conduct of the Union Elections.

(3.) The writ petitioner-Company states that ever since the reopening of the factory on 19.08.1977, the workmen did not have any respect for the writ petitioner-Management reached before the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu and resorted to deliberate go slow, committing various misconducts in terms of Standing Orders, Rules, Practices and Convention regarding the factory working and other acts of indiscipline including threatening, abusing, intimidating and making false allegations on supervisory and other senior staff. The industrial unrest continued thereafter and it worsened during the beginning of October 1977, leading to violence inside and the factory premises.