BHIKA RAM Vs. STATE OF RAJASTHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS special appeal is arising out of the judgment and order dated May 6, 1998 passed by the learned single Judge of this Court dismissing the Writ Petition No. 2513/1993 filed by the appellant/petitioner.

(2.) THE appellant workman was appointed on muster-roll basis as a workman in the Public Works Department, Sirohi Division on October 1, 1987. In the month of July 1991, his services were terminated by an oral retrenchment order. He, therefore, moved the Conciliation Officer and Labour Welfare Officer, Sirohi-respondent No. 5 raising industrial dispute about his illegal retrenchment from service on the ground that he has completed 240 working days in a calender year with the respondent department. However, the respondent No. 1 refused to refer the dispute to the Labour Court for its decision on the ground that the workman had not completed 240 working days in one calender year, by his impugned order dated April 16, 1993 Annexure 2 to the writ petition ). Aggrieved of that order, the appellant filed the Writ Petition No. 2513/1993 before this Court with a prayer to quash and set aside the oral retrenchment order passed in July, 1991. The learned single Judge after hearing both the learned counsel for the parties dismissed the writ petition by holding that the workman failed to prove that he had completed 240 working days in a calender year, therefore, there was no violation of Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act (for short 'the Act' ). The learned single Judge further held that the State Government had not committed any error in refusing to make the reference to the Labour Court for the correct adjudication of the dispute by the impugned order dated April 16, 1993. Hence, this special appeal.

(3.) UNDER Section 10 of the Act, the appropriate Government has to make reference either to the Labour Court or the Industrial Tribunal if it is satisfied that there was a dispute between the parties. It appears from the impugned order dated April 16, 1993 that the State Government itself undertook the exercise of deciding as to whether the workman has completed 240 days or not and arrived at the conclusion that the workman failed to prove that he had worked for 240 days in a calender year. In our considered opinion, the State Government had no jurisdiction. It had to only prima facie satisfy as to whether there was a dispute between the workman and the other, side. Once it comes to the conclusion that there was a dispute, then it had to refer the dispute to the competent Labour Court or the Industrial Tribunal, as the case may be. It is only the Labour Court or the Industrial Tribunal which is competent to decide whether there was any dispute or not and the workman was rightly or wrongly terminated from service.