Delhi High Court
Mohd. Suleman vs Northern Steel And General Mills ... on 17 March, 2008
Author: S K Misra
Bench: S K Misra
JUDGMENT
Sudershan Kumar Misra, J.
1. By this petition, Mohd. Suleman has invoked the writ jurisdiction of this Court to impugn an award that was passed on 16.3.2005 in ID No. 83/1993. At the bar, Counsel for the petitioner restricted his claim to the effect that the compensation of Rs. 30,000/- that has been awarded to the petitioner towards illegal retrenchment by the respondent, is too meagre. It appears that the petitioner was employed sometimes in January, 1985 and carried on working till October, 1991 with the respondent mill. He worked as a Furnace Man for a period of five years and ten months. At that time, his last drawn salary was admittedly Rs. 993/- per month. Due to the installation of a mechanical ejector in the mill, the petitioner is stated to have become surplus and his services were dispensed with. Although a number of defenses have been taken by the respondent before the Labour Court, they were all disbelieved. The petitioner was removed from service w.e.f. 12.10.1991. On that date, the respondent also gave the petitioner a sum of Rs. 4156/- towards final payment of his dues in full, including one month's pay in lieu of notice of retrenchment; all of which the petitioner says he never received. After examining the matter, the Labour Court concluded that the management had failed to prove its case, and for that reason, the removal of the workman from service was illegal. The workman was admittedly a daily wager. It was also established in the proceedings that the respondent mill had closed down w.e.f. 21.12.1995. It is in these circumstances that the Labour Court decided to award compensation to the tune of Rs. 30,000/- for his wrongful removal.
2. Learned Counsel appearing for the petitioner has sought to urge that this amount does not represent a fair and adequate measure of compensation due to the petitioner. I do not agree. It is quite obvious that when considering the last drawn salary, which was about Rs. 1,000/- per month, what the Labour Court has awarded is really approximately 30 months' salary. It is well established that there is no thumb rule or precise formula for grant of back wages as was held in U.P. State Brassware Corporation Ltd. v. Uday Narain Pandey . Similar is the situation while granting of back wages and other allowances as compensation. There is no hard and fast rule or yardstick for computing such compensation. It depends on the facts and circumstances of each case.
3. In the case at hand, keeping in view the fact that the petitioner had worked for approximately five years, the compensation awarded amounts to 50% of the salary for the tenure he worked. At the same time the approximate return on investment on this amount, taken at 10% would yield the workman approximately Rs. 3,000/- per annum. In other words, he could get three months salary every year, in perpetuity. Looked at in another way, the petitioner could get Rs. 250/- per month which is about 25% of the last drawn salary in perpetuity. At the same time, the petitioner, who was about 30 years old at the time of his removal, was free to obtain any other employment. Also, looking to the fact that the mill had closed down four years after his termination, he would have had to look for alternate employment at that juncture.
4. In the case of Prem Chand v. The Management of The Joint Director, Information & Public Relations WP(C) No. 950/2008 decided on 6.2.2008, whilst observing the shift in the judicial trend whereby reinstatement is no longer an inevitable consequence in all cases of illegal termination of service, this Court upheld the award of the Labour Court granting compensation of Rs. 20,000/- in lieu of reinstatement. There, the workman had worked with the management on part time basis for two hours on a monthly salary of Rs. 500/- per month for about six years. This Court held that, "... a rough calculation will show that the Labour Court has in fact directed payment of compensation equivalent to 40 months of earnings. To put it differently, it has given him compensation amounting to the salary over a period of three years, which is also more than half of his tenure with his employer."
5. Here also, the quantum of compensation is equal to roughly half the salary earned throughout his tenure. Furthermore, as pointed out earlier that there is no hard and fast rule for computing compensation; the decision of the Labour Court to award this amount cannot, under the circumstances, be termed as perverse or irrational, nor can it be said that it has caused a failure of justice warranting interference by a writ court.
6. Consequently, the writ petition is dismissed.
