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"It shall be the duty of the Labour Court to decide complaints relating to unfair labour practices described in item 1 of Schedule IV and to try offences punishable under this Act."

When we turn to Schedule IV item no.1, we find therein listed number of heads of `unfair labour practice's which can support any complaint thereunder. The relevant clauses of item no.1 of Schedule IV which were invoked by the respondent for supporting his complaint against the impugned retrenchment order were clauses (a), (b), (d) and (f). Item no.1 with all its sub-clauses reads as under :- "To discharge or dismiss employees - (a) by way of victimisation; (b) not in good faith, but in the colourable exercise of the employer's rights; (c) by falsely implicating an employee in a criminal case on false evidence or on concocted evidence; (d) for patently false reasons; (e) on untrue or trumped up allegations of absence without leave; (f) in utter disregard of the principles of natural justice in the conduct of domestic enquiry or with undue haste; (g) for misconduct of a minor or technical character, without having any regard to the nature of the particular misconduct or the past record of service of the employee, so as to amount to a shockingly disproportionate punishment."

The very first item (`a') deals with the discharge or dismissal order passed by way of victimisation of the employee. It is easy to visualise that an employer may like to dispense with the services of an employee who, according to him, is a trouble maker. He may not have been involved in any misconduct as such still by way of putting an end to his service on extraneous reasons, if an order of discharge is passed it may remain simpliciter order of discharge but if it is found based on extraneous reasons it would be by way of victimisation. Such a discharge order may not necessarily be a punitive discharge order. The employer would not like to punish the employee for any of his misconduct but would not like him to continue in service as according to the employer he may be an undesirable person not suitable to the management is for example a militant trade union leader who, according to the employer, is any how to be required to be sent out of service. When such type of discharge orders are passed by way of victimisation they would be simpliciter discharge orders when not backed up by relevant reasons. It cannot be said that such simpliciter discharge orders are not covered by item `1' clause (`a') of Schedule IV. Similarly clause (`b') may contemplate a discharge order which is not passed in good faith but in the colourable exercise of employer's rights. Thus, the employer may have merely a pretext to put an end to the service of the employee who may not have misconducted himself at all. Therefore, there will be no occasion to have any departmental inquiry against him as no charge could be framed regarding any misconduct on his part. Still if such an undesirable employee is to be removed from service then even though the simpliciter discharge order is passed if it is shown that it is not in good faith but as a result of malafide intention of the employer, then such a discharge order can also attract the category of `unfair labour practice' as enacted by the Legislature in item nos. (`a') and (`b'). Similar Legislature scheme is discernible from clause (c) of item no. 1 which deals with an order of discharge or dismissal by falsely implicating an employee in a criminal case on false evidence or on concreted evidence. In such a situation discharge or dismissal order may operate as a penal order. Similarly, clause (d) may cover cases which are orders of discharge or dismissal by way of penalty as well as simpliciter discharge orders based on a patently false reasons. Clause (e) referring to discharge or dismissal may cover both the cases of dismissal by way of penalty on such grounds or discharge by way of penalty on such grounds and equally a discharge order simplicitor on account of false allegations of absence without leave. So far as Clause (f) is concerned, the first part squarely covers a case of dismissal or discharge by way of penalty as it deals with such orders passed after conducting domestic inquiry about the alleged misconduct of the employee but in utter disregard of the principles of natural justice but so far as the second part of clause (f) of item no.1 is concerned, if an employee is dismissed with undue haste it may be by way of penalty as in domestic inquiry apart from following the principles of natural justice, sufficient and reasonable opportunity to defend may be denied to the employee and with undue haste the dismissal order may be passed. That would obviously be a penal order but so far as discharge order is concerned, it may also be passed by way of penalty with undue haste but the said part of clause (f) may equally cover those discharge orders which are simpliciter discharge orders not by way of penalty but still being passed with undue haste on the part of the employer who may not be wishing to punish the employee but wishing to say goodbye to the employee on the ground that he is otherwise an unwanted person. Such discharge orders passed with undue haste may not necessarily be penal and still may amount to `unfair labour practice' if they are passed with undue haste. Clause (g) of item no.1 obviously refers to only discharge or dismissal orders which are penal in nature as they have a direct linkage with misconduct of the employee.
The aforesaid resume of various clauses of item no.1 of Schedule IV leaves no room for doubt that when the Legislature used the words `discharge' or `dismissal' of the employees under circumstances enumerated in clauses (a) to
(g) in item no.1 of Schedule IV it contemplated dismissal orders which obviously are penal in nature but it also contemplated discharge orders which may either be penal or non- penal in nature and still if any of the relevant clauses of item no. 1 got attracted in connection with such discharge orders they would make the employer, author of such discharge orders answerable for the alleged `unfair labour practice' permeating the passing of such simpliciter discharge orders. To recapitulate, in the present case, respondent's complaint is not that his discharge was by way of penalty but his complaint is that the discharge order in his case was a result of victimisation and was not passed in good faith but was passed on patently false reasons and was a result of undue haste on the part of the appellant-employer. Whether the said complaint was justified on merits or not is a different matter but it can not be said that such a complaint regarding non-penal discharge order was dehors the scope and ambit of item no.1 of Schedule IV of the Maharashtra Act. Before parting with the discussion on this aspect we may mention that learned counsel for the appellant also relied upon the other rule of interpretation, namely, rule of ejusdem generis. The said rule of interpretation provides as follows :

Once this ground is cleared, the arena of contest between the parties becomes well defined. It has to be pleaded and proved by the respondent-complainant that though the order of termination or retrenchment was not passed by way of penalty by the appellant, it attracted all or any of the clauses (a),(b),(d) & (f) of item no.1 of Schedule IV as his complaint was based on these clauses only. In the light of the evidence which is on record and on which there is no dispute between the parties, it becomes clear that the appellant wanted to switch over to the process of composing by utilising photo type-setting machine and in the process the hand composing department engaging respondent and other workmen had to be wound up. That naturally resulted in the employees in the erstwhile hand composing department becoming excess and surplus. That is the reason why impugned notice under Section 9-A of the I.D. Act was issued to the respondent and other workmen and ultimately resulted in the impugned retrenchment order. It is difficult to appreciate how such an action on the part of the appellant can be treated to have been the result of victimisation. The respondent was not being victimised for any extraneous reason. On the contrary, it was based on a genuine factual reason. Hence clause (a) of item no.1 of Schedule IV is out of picture. Parameters of the term `victimisation' have been considered by a three Judge Bench of this Court in the case of Colour-chem Limited vs. A.L. Alaspurkar & Ors. [1998 (1) Scale 432], where one of us, S.B.Majmudar J., speaking for the Bench in para 13 of the report observed that the term `victimisation' is a term of comprehensive import. Thus, if a person is made to suffer by treatment, it would amount to victimisation. On the facts of the present case, therefore, it is not possible to hold that the impugned discharge of the respondent was based on non-germane or extraneous reasons or it was passed with a view to make the respondent suffer for no real reason.