MESSRS. SHALIMAR W'ORKS LIMITED. versus THEIR WORKMEN

Citation: [1960] 1 S.C.R. 150 · Decided: 08-05-1959 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: BHUVNESHWAR PRASAD SINHA · Disposal: Case Partly allowed

Judgment (excerpt)

1959 
May 8 
150 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS (1960(1)] 
MESSRS. SHALIMAR W'ORKS LIMITED. 
v. 
THEIR \VORKMEN 
(B. P. SINHA, P. B. GAJENDRAGADKAR and 
K. N. WANCHOO, JJ.) 
Industrial Dispute-Reinstate1nent-Pending adJUdiciition-
Illegal strike by workmen-Management discharging workmen with-
out permission of Tribunal--Reference, delayed and vague-Whether 
tcorkmcn entitled to reinstatement on such reference. 
On March 23, 1948, while certain disputes were under 
adjudication the workmen pressed the same demands tpon the 
company for immediate solution \\'ithout a\vaiting the a·vard of 
the tribunal. The company refused to meet the demanis and 
thereupvn the workmen went on an illegal sit-down strik,, The 
company closed the works indefinitely and notified that all those 
workmen who had resorted to the illegal strike were disoharged 
from that date. On July 5 the company notified that the works 
would open on July 6 and all old employees could apply for re. 
engagement upto July 2r. A majority of them applied for being 
retaken and all those who applied upto July 21 were takm but 
those who applied after that date were refused. On Novem)er 18, 
1953. the Governm.ent made a reference in respect >f the 
reinstatenl(·nt of 250 old \vorkmen \vho had not heen rctaken. 
Ko list of the 250 \\·orkmcn \Vas sent to the tribunal nor \\'<.S such 
a list filed e\'en during the adjudication proceedings but after the 
arguments on behalf of the company \Vere over a carclessly 
pre pa red list of 220 persons was filed before the tribunal b' the 
workmen on December 14, 1953· The Tribunal ordered reirntate-
.ment without specifying who were to be reinstated. It di:ected 
the company to give a general notice notifying the strikers to 
come and 'join their duties on a fixed date and to reinstatethose 
who applied within the time allowed. On appeal, the labour 
Appellate Tribunal upheld the order of reinstatement in Bspect 
of r5 workmen only. 
Held, that there \Vas no reason for ordering reinstaterrent of 
any of the "'·orkmen on such a vague reference made afte: such 
an unreasonable delay. It was reasonable that disputes hould 
hl~ referred as soon as possible after they had arisen ant after 
conciliation proceedings had failed, particularly in cases of vhole-
sale discharge of workmen followed by fresh recruitmnt of 
labour. Though the workmen were discharged duriig the 
pendency of a dispute in Yiolation of s. 33 of the Inrustrial 
Disputes Act, 1947• the remedy of the workmen was to apply 
under s. 33-A of the Act; but that was not done. This ddect in 
the discharge of the workmen could be i!(nored in the crcum-
stances of this case on account of the illegal strike, the faiure to 
S.C.R. 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
151 
avail of the remedy under s. 33-A ancl the delay and vagueness 
r959 
of the reference which all show that the workmen were not 
interested in reinstatement. 
Shalimar Works 
Limited. 
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION: 
Civil Appeals 
v. 
Nos. 317 & 318 of 1950. 
Their Workmen 
Appeals by special leave from the judgment and 
order dated the 29th June 1955 of the Labour Appel-
late Tribunal of India at Calcutta in Appeals Nos. 
Cal. 61 and 81 of 1954. 
N. C. Chatterjee, S. N. Mukherjee and B. N. Ghose, 
for the appellants in C. A. No. 317 of 56 and respon-
dent No. 1 in C. A. No. 318 of 56. 
A. V. Viswanatha SaBtri, A. K. Dutt and B. P. 
Maheshwari, for the appellants in C. A. No. 318 of 56 
and respondents in C. A. No. 317 of 56. 
1959. May 8. The Judgment of the Court was 
delivered by 
W ANCHOO J.-These are two appeals by special leave 
Wanchoo J. 
against the same decision of the Labour Appellate 
Tribunal of India in a dispute between Messrs. Shalimar 
Works Ltd., Howrah (hereinafter called the company) 
and its workmen represented by two unions (herein-
after called the workmen). 
Appeal No. 317 is by the 
company while appeal No. 318 is by the workmen. 
We shall dispose them of by one judgment. 
There was a dispute between the company and its 
workmen on a number of matters and it was referred 
to the Sixth Industrial Tribunal for adjudication by 
the Government of West Bengal. 
Only two matters 
now survive out of the many referred to the Tribunal, 
namely, (1) profit sharing bonus and (2) reinstatement 
of 250 old workmen. 
We shall first deal with the question of profit sharing 
bonus. It appears that the company had a profit 
sharing bonus scheme in force on the following lines. 
It provided that after making certain d

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