D P DUNDERDELE Vs. G P MUKHERJEE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The point for determination on this application is whether the firm of Calcutta Solicitors called 'Sandersons & Morgans' can be said to be an industry so as to be liable to haw their disputes with their employees determined by the principles and procedure laid down by the Industrial Disputes Act.

(2.) The application is made by the partners of the registered firm of Solicitors Messrs. Sandersons and Morgans. They all practice in this High Court as Solicitors and attorneys. The application is made under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. It asks for a Writ of Certiorari and prohibition to quash the order of reference to the Industrial Tribunal dated 5-9-1956 and the interim award made by the Industrial Tribunal on 6-5-1957 and to restrain the respondents from giving effect to that award. The Tribunal by its interim award held that the firm of Solicitors Messrs. Sandersons & Morgans carry on a work which is industry within the meaning of Section 2 (j) of the Industrial Disputes Act. The respondents include the Industrial Tribunal as well as the Sandersons & Morgans Employees Union.

(3.) A preliminary point on jurisdiction under Article 226 may be disposed of at the outset. The Employees Union contends that the decision of the Tribunal cannot be corrected by Certiorari or prohibition under Article 226 of the Constitution on the ground that it is at best an erroneous decision in law on the question of the construction of the different statutory provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act and therefore there is no question of jurisdiction. I am unable to accept that contention. If the firm of Solicitors cannot be said to carry on an industry, then the Industrial Tribunal has no jurisdiction over them to determine a dispute between them and their employees. If the Tribunal has claimed jurisdiction, be it by way of construction of Statute or otherwise, then this assumption of jurisdiction, whether by the legal process of construction of Statute or by the determination of what is known as "jurisdictional fact", can be supervised under Certiorari jurisdiction of this High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. For instance, I should be much surprised, if I am told that if the Government wrongly makes an order of reference to an Industrial Tribunal of a domestic dispute between husband and wife as an industrial dispute and the Tribunal proceeds to hold that the home is an industry and, therefore, it has jurisdiction to decide such disputes under the Industrial Disputes Act, then in that event this Court has no jurisdiction to set aside such a reference and such an application of the Industrial Disputes Act to a subject which does not come within its purview at all on the plea that the Tribunal decides "home" to be industry by a mere erroneous decision in law through a process of construction of the different sections of the industrial Disputes Act. It is quite true, and I have said so often, that every question of construction of Statutes does not always involve a problem of jurisdiction. But this one in the instant case does. I therefore overrule this point of preliminary objection.