Newspapers Ltd., Allahabad vs U.P. State Industrial Tribunal And Ors. on 4 May, 1960

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: supreme-court

Case Number: Not extracted

Decision Date: 4 May, 1960

Coram: P.B. Gajendragadkar, K.N. Wanchoo, K.C. Das Gupta

In the matter before the Court, the appellant identified as Newspapers Ltd., a publishing house located in Allahabad, operated three newspapers: the Leader, the Bharat, and the Sangam. The Sangam newspaper was not profitable, and the losses incurred from that publication created a financial strain that forced the appellant to cease its operation. As a result of the closure of the Sangam, the appellant terminated the employment of several of its workers, who are identified in the record as respondents numbered three, four, and five. The termination of these employees gave rise to an industrial dispute that was taken up by the State Government. The Government referred the dispute to an industrial tribunal for adjudication under the notification issued on 15 January 1953, which invoked sections three, four, and eight of the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, and also in accordance with clause ten of the Government Order dated 15 March 1951. After hearing the matter, the industrial tribunal concluded that the appellant had not engaged in victimisation of the workers. However, the tribunal held that the appellant had failed to observe the industrial principle commonly expressed as “first come, last go.” In applying that principle, the tribunal observed that respondents numbered six, seven, and eight, who were junior in service to respondents three, four, and five, should have been the first group to be retrenched. Because the appellant offered no satisfactory explanation for preferring to retrench respondents three, four, and five rather than respondents six, seven, and eight, the tribunal ordered that the appellant reinstate respondents three, four, and five. The appellant appealed against the tribunal’s award, but the appellate tribunal dismissed the appeal and confirmed the order directing reinstatement. During the pendency of these proceedings, the appellant also terminated the services of respondents six, seven, and eight.

Subsequent to the proceedings before the appellate tribunal, respondents six, seven, and eight filed a writ petition, numbered 243 of 1953, in the Allahabad High Court, seeking to challenge the validity of the industrial tribunal’s award that required the reinstatement of respondents three, four, and five. In response, the appellant filed its own writ petition, numbered 1421 of 1954, before the same High Court. Both petitions were heard by Justice Chaturvedi, who dismissed each of them. The respondents six, seven, and eight then filed an appeal against the dismissal of their writ petition, but that appeal was rejected on the ground that those respondents were not parties to the tribunal’s order. The appellant subsequently filed another appeal, numbered 36 of 1955, contesting the dismissal of its own writ petition. That appeal was considered on its merits by the appellate court and was ultimately dismissed. The appellant has now approached this Court by way of a special leave petition against the last-mentioned dismissal. It is noteworthy that, in the paper book prepared for this case, none of the documents pertaining to the appellant’s writ petition number 1421 of 1954 have been reproduced. Moreover, the documents relating to the companion writ petition filed by respondents six, seven, and eight appear to have been omitted inadvertently. This omission has made it extremely difficult for the appellant’s counsel to refer to the record of the proceedings in support of any argument.

In the record of the case the documents relating to the appellant’s writ petition No. 1421 of 1954 were not printed. Because of this omission, the counsel for the appellant, Mr. S.P. Sinha, found it extremely difficult to refer to any specific part of the proceedings as a basis for his arguments. Nevertheless, he maintained that the lower courts had erred in rejecting the appellant’s submission that the dispute concerning the retrenchment of respondents three to five was not an industrial dispute. He characterized the matter as an individual grievance that had been raised without the sponsorship of any trade union or any collective body of workmen. Both the initial trial judge, Chaturvedi J., and the appellate court reached the same conclusion contrary to the appellant’s position. Chaturvedi J. recorded that, on the evidence placed before him, he was satisfied that an organisation known as the Leader Press Karamchari Sangh existed and that this association had sponsored the cause of respondents three to five. The appellate court affirmed this finding, thereby confirming that the dispute had indeed been presented by a recognised body of workmen. The presence of such sponsorship, in the view of the courts, transformed the grievance into an industrial dispute within the meaning of the relevant labour statutes, and consequently the argument that the case was purely personal was dismissed.

The appellant then argued that because the Leader Press Karamchari Sangh was an unregistered entity, its sponsorship could not give rise to an industrial dispute and therefore the tribunal’s reference was invalid. Both the trial court and the appellate court rejected this contention, holding that registration of the sponsoring body is not a prerequisite for a grievance to be classified as industrial. The courts explained that once a collective of workmen, whether acting through a formally registered union or through any other organised group, sponsors a claim, the matter acquires the character of an industrial dispute. Mr. Sinha further submitted that the industrial tribunal had never been presented with evidence establishing the existence of such sponsorship. The Court observed that no plea had been raised before the tribunal contesting the industrial character of the dispute, and therefore the tribunal could not have considered a matter that was not put before it. Subsequently, the appellant sought to rely on the principle that “first come last go” should not apply, asserting that respondents three to five were employed in a department separate from that of respondents six to eight. The Court found that this issue was a factual question that should have been raised in the original writ proceedings. Mr. Sinha conceded that the point had not been argued before the lower courts, which explained why it was absent from their judgments. In view of the lack of a substantive ground for the appeal, the Court dismissed the petition with costs.