TMI Blog2006 (8) TMI 681X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... ure of the workman on a printed proforma of service card. But in the said proforma, no particulars or date of birth was mentioned. This was on 14.04.1960. The workman could know of such error of record in the service record only when a new gate pass was issued to workman in the year 1972, for ingress and egress to and from the work place which for the first time had the date of birth of the workman concerned which, according to the appellant, was purportedly made on the basis of some erroneous entry made by some assistant/clerk of the Management earlier. 4. On 25.08.1972, the workman requested the concerned department of the respondent to correct the record and to thereby enter his actual date of birth as 11.08.1929 in place of 01.11.1923. The said workman was thereafter asked by Chief Personnel Manager of the Management to produce his School Leaving Certificate vide its letter bearing No. DPR/9801/72 by the pen of Chief Personnel Manager of the Management dated 30.10.1972. The workman in compliance of such request submitted the required certificate on 25.11.1972. After a long interval of 8 years of such submission of the School Leaving Certificate, the Director of Personnel ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... l Company, Ltd. Jamshedpur from 13.09.1987 is justified. If not, what relief he is entitled? 6. The Presiding Officer, Labour Court upon appearance of the parties and after recording the respective statement of the oral evidence etc. considered the submissions and arguments of the workman and of the Management passed an award on 13.03.1995 in favour of the workman. The Labour Court observed in the award that the contentions of the Management were not supported by evidence and no evidence was adduced by the Management which could legitimately substantiate their case. The Labour Court passed the Award holding that the workman is entitled to full back wages including admissible allowances and other benefits for the period from 13.09.1987 his date of illegal superannuation to 11.08.1990 the actual date of retirement. The payment was directed to be paid within 2 months failing which the amount could be realized with interest @ 12%. 7. The respondent Management being aggrieved challenged the Award passed by the Labour Court by moving a writ petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India before the Ranchi Bench of the Patna High Court. After reorganization of t ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... The workman, however, contended that he never accepted the erroneous recording of date of birth but had been contesting the same ever since 1972 when the error was brought to his notice for the first time by the Management as aforesaid. 10. He would further submit that the Labour Court passed the Award in favour of the workman upon consideration of all the facts, circumstances and the evidences - oral and documentary adduced by both parties to the case and that the Labour Court categorically observed in the Award that the contentions of the Management were not supported by evidence. There was no evidence adduced by the Management which could legitimately substantiate their case. Ultimately, there were categorical findings regarding the following facts: 1. But Service Card shows that entry of the age in the service Card was not attested by the workman at the time of employment. It goes to show that before 14.04.1960 Service Card was not shown to the workman and entry was not attested by him which is against the provision of the works standing order. The workman has stated that when his signature was obtained in the Service Card on 14.04.1960 entry of his age was not menti ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... was clearly one-sided and perverse. Learned counsel for the appellant further submitted that the Division Bench also failed to appreciate that in a writ petition arising from an Award in an industrial dispute matter, the findings arrived at by the Labour Court on the basis of the materials and evidence recorded in the case oral and documentary, the Writ Court cannot set aside the findings of the Labour Court on the basis of alleged non-consideration or ignoring of certain materials by the Labour Court as a Court of appeal. In other words, learned Counsel submitted that the Division Bench fell in grave error of jurisdiction in re-assessing and re-valuing the weight of evidence in the case recorded by the Labour Court, by which it came to a conclusion that the workman was illegally and prematurely superannuated, in the service under the respondent. The respondent failed to produce any reliable evidence, much less any of the relevant contemporaneous documents relating to their contention in defence and in order to rebut the evidence produced by the workman in support of his case of illegal superannuation. He would further submit that the High Court has wrongly relied upon the one-sid ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... fell in grave error in discarding the opinion and findings of the Medical Board merely on the ground that no medical officer of the Company, who assessed the age of the workman, was examined nor any report of the Medical Board had been filed. He further submitted that the High Court in its jurisdiction can interfere with the findings of the Labour Court if the findings are perverse. 13. The Management also filed I.A. No. 3 of 2006 for filing additional documents on behalf of the Management because according to them all the documents which were filed before the Labour Court were not available with the respondent because the same were not traceable being the old ones and were filed before the Labour Court in 1991. Therefore, they filed additional documents along with I.A. No. 3 of 2006 and our attention was also drawn to those annexures and we have perused the same. We have carefully perused the entire records. The case of the Management is that the workman was employed in 1947 and his date of birth was recorded as 24 years based on the assessment of his age by the Company's Medical Officer and that the workman confirmed his age by putting his signature on the service record ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... in 1947; (b) the workman was examined by the Medical Board and his age was assessed; (c) In 1960 a service card was issued to the appellant by the Management wherein the age of the workman was recorded as 24 years and the same was duly accepted by the workman by putting his signature; (d) Only in 1972, for the first time, the workman produced a transfer certificate issued from the school and disputed his age; (e) The said transfer certificate was sent to the District Education officer who informed the Management that the transfer certificate was not genuine; (f) It is also not disputed that after the age rectification committee took a decision the workman was examined by a specially constituted Medical Board in 1984 and his age was assessed as 13.09.1926. (g) The service record was again corrected and it was made in 1926. In this way, the service of the workman was increased by 2 years. (h) The workman accepted the age assessed by the Medical Board in 1984 and according to the age so assessed by the Medical Board workman was increased by 2 years. Therefore, according to the assessment of the age made by the Medical Board, the workman wa ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... dated 20.11.1980 that the certificate produced by him was not genuine. e) The workman again produced another certificate dated 19.02.1984 purportedly issued by the Headmaster of the School, inter alia, mentioning the date of birth as 11.08.1929. The then Chief Personnel Manager again sought confirmation about the genuineness of the certificate from the District Education Officer, Dacca but no reply was received by the Management. f) The workman would have retired on 31.10.1983 by counting his superannuation from the date of birth i.e. 01.11,1923, as noted at the time of the employment. g) However, the Company, as a special case in the aforesaid circumstances, referred the matter to its Age Rectification Committee. The said Committee met on 23.07.1984 and decided to refer the case of the workman to a special Medical Board for assessment of the age of the workman as a special case. Accordingly, workman was sent to the Medical Board for assessment of his age and the Medical Board assessed the age of the workman as 58yrs on 13.09.1984 meaning thereby date of birth as 13.09.1926. The said assessment of the Rectification committee was also informed to the workman vide let ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... company. 17. Learned Single Judge of the High Court allowed the writ petition by the Management keeping in view of the law laid down by this Court in Bharat Coking Coal Ltd. (supra) case. The High Court, in our view, was fully justified in setting aside the Award of the Labour Court as the said Award was perverse and illegal inasmuch as the judgment of this Court in Bharat Coking Coal Ltd. (supra) was ignored by the Labour Court. It is also to be noticed that the Company has not relied upon the report of the District Education Officer, Dacca, wherein it was written that the entry is in the transfer certificate submitted by the petitioner are not at all genuine. It is only because of the uncertainty about the date of birth of the workman, the Company constituted a special Medical Board in 1984 to determine the age and hence the date of birth of the workman. 18. Mr. Mukherjee relied on Jiwan Kishore v. Delhi Transport Corporation and Anr. (1981) ILLJ 271 SC which is a short judgment rendered by this Court. The sole question raised in that appeal is as to the age of the employee- appellant. There was a discrepancy, which was rather wide since the year of birth, according to ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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