DINESH PRASAD Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The two meaningful issues that came to the fore in this set of cases referred for an authoritative decision by the Full Bench may well be precisely formulated in the terms following :-

(2.) The relevant facts and issues of law are admittedly common and identical in these 13 writ petitions and learned counsel for the parties therefore, are agreed that this judgment will govern all of them. The representative matrix of fact may be take from Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.5724 of 1983, Ram Mohan Chaudhary v. Chairman, Mithila Kshetriya Gramin Bank, Darbhanga. The writ petitioner therein claims to have been temporarily appointed as a clerk by the Chairman of the respondent Mithila Kshetriya Gramin in Bank, Darbhanga, and, thereafter performed his duties from the 17th July, 1981 till the 5th October 1981. His services were apparently terminated thereafter, but it is claimed that by several subsequent appointment letters the petitioner served in the same capacity for varying periods commencing from the 17th July 1981 to the 20th July 1982. It is sought to be claimed that the petitioner has rendered 336 days of continuous service within the meaning of S.25B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), and on these premises, is entitled to the benefit under S.25F of the said Act. Apprehending that the petitioner's services would be terminated, he instituted a title suit being Title Suit No.65 of 1982 in the Court of the First Munsif, Darbhanga and secured a temporary injunction restraining the defendant Bank from terminating the petitioner's services. Against this injunction, the respondent Bank filed a miscellaneous appeal before the District Judge of Darbhanga, which was allowed and the injunction granted was vacated. Consequent thereto the respondent Bank, by a wholly non-stigmatic and innocuous letter terminated the writ petitioner's services as these were no longer required. Thereafter, the petitioner chose to withdraw the title suit and he preferred the present writ petition, claiming the relief wholly under S.25F of the Act.

(3.) At the very threshold stage of admission, the learned counsel for the petitioner had asserted that the remedy under S.10 of the Act was not an adequate remedy and, consequently the writ petitioner was entitled to invoke the writ jurisdiction straightway without resorting to or exhausting the statutory remedy admittedly available to him under the Act In view of the significance of the matter involved, the case was referred for an authoritative decision by a Full Bench.