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process, operation or other work in any other establishment and overruled the judgment rendered in the case of Air India Statutory Corporation and Others v. United Labour Union and Others (Supra) making it clear that neither Section 10 nor any other provision in the CLRA Act provides for automatic absorption of contract labour on issuance of notification by the appropriate Government under Section 10(1) of the CLRA Act and consequently, the principal employer is not required by operation of law to absorb the contract labour working in the establishment.

Reference in this regard be made to paragraphs Nos. 68, 88, 105 and 125 of Steel Authority of India Limited and Others v. National Union Waterfront Workers and Others, (Supra) which are being quoted hereunder :-

68. We have extracted above Section 10 of the CLRA Act which empowers the appropriate Government to prohibit employment of contract labour in any process, operation

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or other work in any establishment, lays down the procedure and specifies the relevant factors which shall be taken into consideration for issuing notification under sub-section (1) of Section 10. It is a common ground that the consequence of prohibition notification under Section 10(1) of the CLRA Act, prohibiting employment of contract labour, is neither spelt out in Section 10 nor indicated anywhere in the Act. In our view, the following consequences follow on issuing a notification under Section 10(1) of the CLRA Act:

(5) the contractor can utilise the services of the contract labour in any other establishment in respect of which no notification under Section 10(1) has been issued where all the benefits under the CLRA Act which were being enjoyed by it, will be available;

(6) if a contractor intends to retrench his contract labour, he can do so only in conformity with the provisions of the ID Act.

The point now under consideration is: whether automatic absorption of contract labour working in an establishment, is implied in Section 10 of the CLRA Act and follows as a consequence on issuance of the

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consideration of factors enumerated in sub-section (2) of Section 10 of the Act among other relevant factors. But, the presence of some or all those factors, in our view, provides no ground for absorption of contract labour on issuing notification under sub-section (1) of Section 10. Admittedly, when the concept of automatic absorption of contract labour as a consequence of issuing notification under Section 10(1) by the appropriate Government, is not alluded to either in Section 10 or at any other place in the Act and the consequence of violation of Sections 7 and 12 of the CLRA Act is explicitly provided in Sections 23 and 25 of the CLRA Act, it is not for the High Courts or this Court to read in some unspecified remedy in Section 10 or substitute for penal consequences specified in Sections 23 and 25 a different sequel, be it absorption of contract labour in the establishment of principal employer or a lesser or a harsher punishment. Such an interpretation of the provisions of the statute will be far beyond the principle of ironing out the creases and the scope of interpretative legislation and as such, clearly impermissible. We have already held above, on consideration of various aspects, that it is difficult to accept that Parliament intended absorption of contract labour on issue of abolition notification under Section 10(1) of the CLRA Act.