Civil court lacks jurisdiction to entertain suit structured on provisions of Industrial Disputes Act: SC

The Supreme Court has declared that a civil court lacked jurisdiction to entertain a plea against termination of an employee under the Industrial Disputes Act.

A bench of Justices R Subhash Reddy and Hrishikesh Roy, in a judgment, upheld the view taken by the Himachal Pradesh High Court which overturned the direction for reinstatement of an employee in the state electricity board on the ground that the civil court lacked jurisdiction to issue such an order.

The employer here claimed the matter should have been raised before the labour court.

The top court dismissed an appeal filed by Milkhi Ram against the High Court's judgement, which allowed the jurisdictional objection by the electricity board.

"This court is unable to accept the view propounded by the courts below and is of the considered opinion that the civil court lacks jurisdiction to entertain a suit structured on the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act. The decree favouring the plaintiff is a legal nullity and the finding of the High Court to this extent is upheld," the bench said.

The court, however, ordered that the arrears sum paid to the employee following the decree should not be recovered considering the hardships faced by him.

The services of the daily wage employee were dispensed with by the electricity board on January 1, 1985. The employee claimed to have rendered uninterrupted service for 2778 days and asserted his right to be regularised. However, the electricity board, on the other hand, contended that he never worked for a continuous period of 240 days and thus was disentitled to claim regularisation.

On his plea, a civil court ordered his regularisation with back wages.

An appeal by the electricity board subsequently was dismissed by the district court, which said the issue of jurisdiction was a mixed question of law and facts and since the litigation continued for long, it would not be proper to relegate him to the labour court. It also said the workman was entitled to choose the remedy either before the civil court or before the Industrial court.

The termination of the daily wager's service was treated as retrenchment without compliance with provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act. On August 22, 2001, the electricity board offered the employee the post of lower division clerk but the employee failed to give a proper joining report.

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