1. This petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India has been preferred with the following prayers:
"(A) Your Lordships be pleased to issue writ of mandamus or appropriate writ and/or certiorari or direction directing the respondent No.1 not to alter or change the service conditions of the petitioners and be pleased to direct the respondent No.1 to continue the present petitioners with the respondent No.1.
(B) Your Lordships be further pleased to direct the respondent Nos.1 & 2, not to terminate the services of any of the petitioners till the final adjudication of the present petition pending admission, hearing and final disposal of this petition.
(C) Your Lordships be pleased to pass such other and further order as the nature and circumstances of the case may require."
2. The brief facts of the case as emerging from the averments made in the petition are that the petitioners (14 in numbers) are stated to be working with respondent No.1 as daily labourers, since the last more than 17 to 20 years. According to the petitioners, they have not been granted benefits equivalent of those granted to permanent employees and are only being given daily wages, though they are working on permanent and vacant posts in the sanctioned set up by respondent No.1 which is the Directorate of National Research Center for Groundnut, which is stated to be a Unit run by the Central Government. According to the petitioners, respondent No.1 has entered into a contract with respondent No.2 for the work carried out by the petitioners, with effect from 16.6.2012. It is the case of the petitioners that this contract is a sham and bogus one and has been entered only with a view to avoid the granting of the benefits of permanency to the petitioners.
3. Apprehending that their services may be terminated by respondent No.1 due to the said contract with respondent No.2, the petitioners have approached this Court by making the prayers reproduced hereinabove.
4. Mr.
P.C. Chaudhary, learned advocate for the petitioners, has submitted that the petitioners have already set in motion the machinery under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 ("the Act" for short) and have made an application before the Assistant Commissioner of Labour (Central), Gandhidham on 13.6.2012. A copy of the said application has been tendered to the Court for perusal. The same is taken on record. It is further submitted that the machinery under the Act, though set in motion, is slow and the petitioners may be terminated before the Reference is filed. It is, therefore, prayed that they may be protected till the Reference is made.
5. In support of this submission, the learned advocate for the petitioners has placed reliance upon the judgment of this Court in Food Corporation of India Workers' Union Vs. Food Corporation of India reported in 2001 (1) G.L.H. (90).
6. Having heard the learned advocate for the petitioners and upon perusal of the judgment in Food Corporation of India Workers' Union Vs. Food Corporation of India (Supra), it transpires that in the said judgment relied upon by the learned advocate for the petitioners, the Employees were working under the contractor engaged by the Food Corporation of India. The Union had approached the Court against the policy of the FCI (Food Corporation of India) of employing different kinds of food handling labour for the same kind of work. The Court eventually relegated the petitioners therein to avail the statutory remedy while keeping in place the interim arrangement/ protection that was operating in the matter. The facts of that case are on a different footing from those obtaining in the case in hand, where the petitioners have already availed of the remedy under the Act. Not only that, they have simultaneously, approached this Court by making similar prayers. The present petition has been admitted to file on 13th June, 2012. On the same day, the petitioners have made an application before the Assistant Commissioner of Labour (Central), Gandhidham on 13.6.2012.
7. In this view of the matter, the petitioners cannot be permitted to avail of two remedies simultaneously. As proceedings under the Act have already been initiated, in my view, it would not be appropriate for the Court to interfere.
8. In above circumstances, the petition cannot be entertained.
It is, therefore, rejected.
However, the Assistant Commissioner of Labour (Central), Gandhidham may expedite the proceedings.
(Smt. Abhilasha Kumari, J.) PIYUSH Top