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10. The Division Bench found that (1) "there is no closure of company's establishment and, therefore, the management cannot successfully assail the validity of reference on the ground that it does not raise an industrial dispute". The Bench observed, "nowhere the word closure has been used denoting that the establishment at Hyderabad is closed. The word "surplus" used in the notices is the very antithesis to closure". The Bench also held, on the basis of Exhs.D-23 to 27 and W57, that works at Hyderabad were not over by the date of notices of retrenchment. (2) In view of the finding on the first question, the second question does not arise and that "it is incumbent on the. part of the company to absorb workmen sought to be retrenched"; and (3) "there is functional integrality between the workmen at Vizag unit and the units at Hyderabad. The service conditions of the workmen in all the units are uniform. There is unity of employment, control, administration and ownership and so there is functional integrality, which makes the Company as the single undertaking. If that be so, the conclusion which is irresistible, is that the units at Hyderabad are not separate establishment but they are all components of one single establishment. If that be so, the inevitable conclusion is that the provisions enacted in section 25-G of the Act which ordains that, whenever there is a retrenchment in any establishment, the rule of seniority must prevail and govern the situation. The com- pany in our undoubted view has been maintaining zonal seniority list and zone being the base for the inter transfers and promotions of the workmen working in the Southern zone, brought in from out of the said zone, they will have to yield by way of preference to the workmen belonging to the southern zone."

15. In the Workmen of the Straw Board Manufacturing Co. Ltd. v. M/s. Straw Board Manufacturing Company Ltd (1974)(3)S.C.R.703), this Court held:

"The most important aspect in this particular case relating to closure, in our opinion, is whether one unit has such componential relation that closing of one must lead to the closing of the other or the one cannot reasonably exist without the other. Functional integrality will assume an added significance in a case of closure of a branch or unit. That the R.Mill is capable of functioning in isolation is of very material import in the case of closure. There is bound to be a shift of emphasis in application of various tests from one case to another. In other words, whether independent functioning of the R.Mill can at all be said to be affected by the closing of the S.Mill............ Me fact of the unity of ownership, supervision and control and some other common features, which we have noticed above, do not justify a contrary conclusion on this aspect in the present case. There is considerable force in the submission of Mr.Chitaley that the R.Mill is a different line of business and the closure of the S.Mill has nothing to do with the functioning of the R.Mill. The matter may be absolutely different when in an otherwise going concern or a func- tioning unit some workmen's services were terminated as being redundant or surplus to requirements. That most of the conditions of service of the two Mills were substantially identical can be easily explained by the fact that, being owned by the same employer and the two units being situated in close proximity, it will not be in the interest of the management and peace and well being of the Company to treat the employees differently creating heart burning and discrimination. For the same reason, there is no particular significance in this case even in the applica- tion of the standing orders of the Company to the employees of the R.Mill which because of the non-requisite number of employees employed in the latter, is not even required under the law to have separate standing order. It is, in our opinion, a clear case of closure of an independent unit of a company and not a closure of a part of an establishment."

16.This decision was followed in Isha Steel Treatment, Bombay v. Association Of Engineering Workers, Bombay & Anr. (1987 (2) S.C.R.414).

17.It has been held repeatedly that all the tests evolved in the several decisions of this Court need not all be satisfied in every case. One has also to look to the nature and character of the undertaking while deciding the question. The tests evolved are merely to serve as guidelines. Now, let us look at the appellant-company. It is a government company wholly owned and controlled by the Government of India. Its job is to undertake construction works both in India and abroad. The construction works are not permanent works in the sense that as soon as the construction work is over the establishment comes to a to an end at that place. In such a case, functional integrality assumes significance. The nature of the construction work may also differ from work to work or place to place, as the case may be. It is not even suggested by the respondent- Union that there is any functional integrality between the several units or several construction works undertaken by the appellant. It is not suggested that closure of one leads to the closure of others. There is no proximity between the several units/works undertaken by the appellant; they are spread all over India, indeed all over the world. It would thus appear that each of the works or construction projects undertaken by the appellant represent distinct- establishments and did not -constitute units of a single establishment. The Division Bench, however, was influenced by the fact that (i) when the workers are transferred from one unit to other unit they carried their seniority with them; (ii) the orders of appointment say that the employees are liable to be transferred to one place to other; that indeed, forty three out of hundred workers concerned herein were brought to Hyderabad on transfer from other places and