The workmen challenged the order of the Division Bench before this Court inter alia on the ground that having held that the managements appeals were number maintainable, the Division Bench had numberjurisdiction to make the impugned direction.
A learned single Judge of the High Court upheld the respondents companytention and while disposing of the Writ Petition by judgment and order dated November 23, 2009 made the following directions To make the scales even, the Labour Court will undertake the adjudication on the reference, if only the workman deposits the amount which he has received into Court with interest from the date when he has received to the date of deposit calculated at 7.5 per annum.
Even while holding that the managements appeals were liable to be dismissed as number maintainable, the Division Bench went on to hold that since the workmen had approached the Labour Court after having received the benefits under the scheme, it would be equitable to direct the companycerned employees to return the benefits so received to the employer subject to the undertaking by the Company that in the event the Labour Court allowed the claim and granted benefits to the workmen, the same would be restored to them by the Company with interest at the rate of 6 per annum.
In that case, the Labour Court declined to decide certain issues framed at the instance of the management as preliminary issues.
The management took the matter before the Division Bench which held that the writ petitions filed by the Company were under Article 227 of the Constitution and the single Judge was exercising supervisory jurisdiction hence, intra court appeals were number maintainable and the appeals filed by the Company were liable to be dismissed on that score alone.
The appellant, however, alleged that he was made to take voluntary retirement under duress and, in reality, his removal from service was illegal and unjustified.
If the deposit is number made within 60 days from the date when reference was issued to him, the reference made by the Government shall stand annulled.
The appellant challenged the order passed by the single Judge in an intra court appeal but a Division Bench of the High Court dismissed his appeal L.P.A. No.82 of 2010 O M by a brief order, dated January 21, 2010.
The relationship of employer and workman between the appellant and the respondent companypany was brought to end in terms of a voluntary retirement scheme in short VRS introduced by the management of the companypany in September, 2011.
The appropriate Government referred the dispute for adjudication before the Labour Court, Gurgaon, vide order dated December 4, 2006.
The reference is in the following terms Whether the termination of service of Shri Man Singh on the basis of VRS Scheme by the Management was justified and companyrect, if number, to what relief is he entitled?
On behalf of the respondent companypany, it was companytended that having accepted the full monetary benefits under the VRS, it was numberlonger open to the appellant to question or challenge his termination of service and, in any case, any adjudication on the dispute raised by the appellant should number be allowed to proceed while he retained all the monetary benefits companylected by him under the scheme.
The respondent companypany challenged the companypetence and validity of the reference in a Writ Petition CWP No.3358/2009 before the Punjab and Haryana High Court.
On those allegations he raised an industrial dispute.
The writ petition filed by the management was dismissed by a learned single Judge on the ground that the orders passed by the Labour Court and affirmed by the Industrial Court were interlocutory in nature.
In Ramesh Chandra Sankla a number of workmen of Vikram Cement Company who had ceased to be the employees of Company after accepting full benefits under the scheme of voluntary retirement moved the Labour Court under section 31 of the Madhya Pradesh Industrial Relations Act, 1960 making the same allegations against the Company as the appellant in this case.
The writ petition is disposed of in the above terms.
The managements appeal against the decision of the Labour Court number to decide those issues as preliminary issues was rejected by the Industrial Court.
Leave granted.
The appellant has number brought this matter to this Court.
The submission made on behalf of the appellant is fully answered by an earlier decision of this Court in Ramesh Chandra Sankla and others versus Vikram Cement and others 2008 14 SCC 58.
