(1.) THIS writ petition under Article 227 of the Constitution of India challenges the order dated 9th April 1992 made by the Judge, Labour Court, Sangli, in Complaint (ULP) No.41 of 1992 and order dated 22nd May 1992 made in Revision Application (ULP) No.38 of 1992 by the Member, Industrial Court, Kolhapur, both under the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (hereinafter referred to as "the Act").
(2.) THE petitioner is a statutory corporation carrying on the business of transport of passengers by bus. The first respondent joined the services of the petitioner as a Conductor-cum-Clerk on 31st July 1960. At the time of joining service, the first respondent had submitted his school leaving certificate in which his date of birth was recorded as 2nd January 1934. The age of superannuation in the service of the petitioner is 58 and, therefore, the first respondent was liable to be superannuated from service on 2nd January 1992. About four months prior to the date of his superannuation, on 1st July 1991, the first respondent submitted an application to the petitioner requesting for rectification of his date of birth on record from 2nd January 1934 to 2nd January 1936. This was rejected. The first respondent made a second application on 2nd January 1992 and reiterated his request for changing the date of birth recorded in the records of the petitioners. This request was also not considered. The first respondent, therefore, came to be superannuated from service with effect from 2nd January 1992.
(3.) THE Labour Court and the Industrial Court have done exactly what the Supreme Court cautioned them agianst. In State of Tamil Nadu vs. T.V. Venugopalan (1994 II CLR 819), it was pointed out by the Supreme Court that the tendency to grant interim injunctions on applications moved at the fag end of career by an employee on the allegation that his recorded date of birth is erroneous must be strictly discouraged. This is exactly what has happened in the present case. There was neither good ground for correcting the date of birth recorded on the records of the petitioner, nor was there any justifying reason as to why such an application could not have been made during the 31 years from 1960 to 1991. The first respondent's date of birth on record was based on the school leaving certificate produced by him which indicated his date of birth as 2nd January 1934. The first respondent produced no documentary evidence which could have clearly demonstrated that the said date of birth as on the record of the petitioner was erroneous. What he relied upon was an affidavit of his mother. It is obvious that such affidavit cannot be relied upon for rectification of the date of birth recorded on the basis of a school leaving certificate produced at the time of joining service. In my view, this case falls within the ratio of the decisions of the Supreme Court in Union of India and others vs. Kantilal Hematram Pandya (AIR 1995 S.C. 1349), Burn Standard Co. Ltd. and others vs. Dinabandhu Majumdar and another (AIR 1995 S.C. 1499), Union of India vs. Harnam Singh (1993 II CLR 193), Secretary and Commissioner, Home Department and others. vs. R.Kriubakaran (1993 II 860) and the judgments of this Court in Bennett Coleman and Company Ltd. vs. Durga Prasad Dube & another (per Brother Shah J.) (1995 II CLR 878) and Sandoz (India) Ltd. & another vs. John Xavier Fernandes & another (Writ Petition No.4652 of 1995) (to which I was a party).