TRIVENI GLASS LTD Vs. STATE OF U P

JUDGEMENT

(1.) JANARDAN Sahai, J. On the basis of a settlement dated 5. 1. 2005 between the petitioner M/s. Triveni Glass Limited (hereinafter referred to as the 'employer') and its workmen, a dispute was referred to arbitration of the Deputy Labour Commissioner under Section 5-B of the U. P. Industrial Disputes Act. The dispute which was referred was whether the termination of the services of. the 50 workmen of Plant No. 1 was justified or legal and if not so what relief the workmen were entitled to. The Deputy Labour Commissioner gave his award dated 30. 10. 2006 said to have been served upon the petitioner by letter dated 21. 9. 2007. The Arbi trator found that the services of the workmen were terminated on account of illegal closure of Plant No. 1 without obtaining permission of the State Govern ment under Section 6-W read with Section 6-V of the U. P. Industrial Disputes Act and he directed that the workmen be reinstated with full back wages. Before the Arbitrator, the employer and the employees represented by M/s. Triveni Sheet Glass Workers Union, had filed their respective written statements. The case of the employer was that it has established five different independent plants for manufacture of glass by different processes apd each of the Plants was a sepa rate establishment there being no functional integrality amongst the plants and as there were less than 300 workers in Plant No. 1, no permission for closure was required under Section 6-W of the U. P. Industrial Disputes Act. The Arbitrator, however, found that the five plants were in fact undertakings of the same industrial establishment and the total number of workmen employed in these five Plants together being more than 500, permission for the closure under Section 6-W read with Section 6-V of the U. P. Industrial Disputes Act was required to be taken.

(2.) I have heard Sri Navin Sinha, Senior Advocate assisted by Sri Vipin Sinha for the employer-petitioner and Sri Rama Kant Misra assisted by Sri U. K. Misra for the respondent-workmen.

(3.) THE consequence of closure without application for permission for closure or despite refusal of permission is provided in sub-section (6) of Section 6-W of the U. P. Industrial Disputes Act and that consequence is that the closure would be illegal and the workmen would be entitled to all the benefits under any law in force as if the undertaking had not been closed down. This irresistible conse quence which flows out of sub-section (6) of Section 6-W cannot be washed away or diluted by any settlement. A settlement is founded on contract and al though stands on high pedestal in Industrial law would crumble down when it runs counter to the legal fiction envisaged in Section 6-W that a closure without per mission is illegal from the very inception and the workmen would be entitled to every benefit they are entitled to under the law. THE Industrial Disputes Act was enacted to prevail over the law of contract governing rights of employer and work men. It would be a contradiction to suggest that the basic rights created by the Act can be done away with under the very law-of contract which the Act intends to override. Even collective bargaining recognized by the Act has its limitations. Benefits conferred upon the workmen for breach of imperative provisions of the Act cannot be bartered away even by collective bargaining. THE contention of the employer's counsel that the settlement dated 9. 8. 2002 is the Magna Carta of the rights of the parties to which the parties must alone look up to for basing their claim is therefore misconceived.