Bombay High Court
Abdul Rashid vs Indian Sailors Home Society And Others on 11 September, 1987
Equivalent citations: (1989)ILLJ6BOM
Author: P.B. Sawant
Bench: P.B. Sawant
JUDGMENT Vaze, J.
1. Indian Sailors Home Society at Masjid Bunder Siding Road, Bombay, is a charitable organisation which caters to the needs of Indian merchant navy ratings below the rank of officers, who have to come to Bombay in search of work. The Society provides for lodging facilities at reasonable rates to about 1000 sailors and the inmates of the Society's hostel manage their cooking on a cooperative basis. The Society is run by a managing committee headed by the Chairman of the Bombay Port Trust and some 18 prominent members including directors of various shipping companies. The contribution from the ratings being nominal, the expenses of running the hostel is met through donations. As the Society is not at present receiving adequate donations, it has suffered a deficit of Rs. 88,140 as on July 1987 and right from 1982, it is running in deficit.
2. Abdul Rashid was employed by the Society as a watchman and after he had put in about 15 years of service, he was sanctioned leave from 5 September 1977 to 11 November 1977. According to the Society all the workmen employed by them had gone on strike with effect from 6 June 1977, and it lasted for 87 days. Abdul Rashid claims that he was not taken back on his job after he reported on duty but the Society claims that the workman did not desire to continue in the service.
3. In Reference IDA No. 270 of 1979 before the Eighth Labour Court the workman examined himself and the Society put one Superintendent in the box. Being mainly the case of documentary evidence, the learned Presiding Officer concluded that it is difficult to accept the stand of the Society that the workman had voluntarily abandoned his job because there was nothing to indicate that the Society informed the workman about his unauthorised absence from duty and asked him to report on duty. The Labour Court thereafter considered the question of relief to be granted to the workman and concluded that as the workman had given an undertaking to the Society on 31st August 1977, he will be deemed to have given up his claim of reinstatement as a peon. Following this reasoning, the Labour Court denied the relief of reinstatement and directed the employer to pay the workman one year's wages as compensation.
4. Aggrieved, the Society has challenged the award by Writ Petition No. 4073 of 1987, while the workman has done so by Writ Petition No. 2141 of 1981, which were heard together.
5. The Labour Court also held that Indian Sailors Home Society is an industry following the Supreme Court's judgment in Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board v. A. Rajappa and others (1978-I-LLJ-349), and distinguished the earlier judgment of this Court in the case of the very same Society in (1974-II-LLJ-227). We find the matter is no longer res intergra in view of the Bangalore Water Supply case (supra), and that the Labour Court was right in coming to the conclusion that the Society is as industry as defined in the Industrial Disputes Act.
6. The Labour Court has denied reinstatement to the workman as a watchman in view of his undertaking given to the Society on 31 August 1977, and instead awarded one year's wages.
7. The so-called undertaking, dated 31 August 1977, is in reply to a letter dated 27 August 1977, written by the Honorary Secretary of the Society to the workman who had sought re-employment. The Honorary Secretary stipulated that the period of strike would be condoned except for the purpose of payment of wages; that the wages which the workman was drawing before the strike would be protected and that his performance will be watched. Thereafter, follows the following condition :
"He will be re-employed on the express understanding that he will have to perform his duties as directed by the Honorary Secretary/Superintendent and will have no claim on the duties he might have performed the strike."
Sri Vishwanath, the learned counsel for the Society, says that even if the Labour Court was wrong in not ordering reinstatement, the position that emerges today is that the Society has already seven watchmen on roll and hence it would be difficult for them to accept the petitioner as a watchman. However, counsel submits that as per the undertaking the workman had worked for seven days till 5 September in the post of a peon, which post has since been abolished but that the Society will be in a position to accommodate Abdul Rashid as a sweeper in the Society. We find that the reasoning of the Labour Court about the termination of services being illegal is correct for the simple reason that if it was the case of voluntary abondonment, the Society would have communicated to the workman and asked him to report on duty. However, we do not find any justification for not following the general principle of reinstatement to the same post because even today the post of the fact (sic) that the society is a charitable organisation, that its expenses are met out of donations and not out of the meagre fees that are charged for the lodging facilities, and that right from 1982, the budget of the Society is in the red. Their four buildings are in need of urgent repairs and the Society does not know how to finance the repairs which would cost about half a crore of rupees. In view thereof the rule in Writ Petition No. 2141 of 1981, is made absolute as far as reinstatement in the post of watchman is concerned but the back-wages to be payable to Abdul Rashid are quantified at Rs. 10,000. Writ Petition No. 4073 of 1987 is dismissed with no order as to costs.