Rs 3 lakh relief to employee terminated 26 years ago

Saurabh Malik

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Chandigarh, July 14

Nearly 26 years after services of Gurnoop Singh were terminated, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has asserted that the relief of reinstatement and continuity in service cannot be denied.

But by the time the Bench reached the conclusion, the workman had already crossed the age of superannuation and relinquished his claim for reinstatement seeking compensation instead. Taking note of his submissions, Justice Sanjay Vashisth of the high court directed a lump sum payment of Rs 3 lakh as compensation to the petitioner, who was drawing a monthly salary of Rs 1,500 before his termination.

Singh had moved the high court in 2012 after Jalandhar Industrial Tribunal held the termination action of Punjab Police Housing Corporation Ltd. illegal and in violation of the ID Act, but awarded a meagre compensation of Rs19,000. Justice Vashisth took just three hearings to decide the matter.

The Bench, during the course of hearing, was told that the petitioner continuously worked till November 1997 after was appointed in July 1992 as ‘work munshi’ by the management-corporation and his termination from service without issuing notice or payment of retrenchment compensation was in violation of Act. Justice Vashisth observed the tribunal concluded that the management/semi-government corporation’s termination action was in violation of the Act. But reinstatement direction could not be issued, “it being a backdoor entry of the workman in service”. The workman was awarded Rs 19,000 compensation instead of reinstatement and other claims, despite rendering the service for so many years.

After going through the tribunal’s observations and the case files, Justice Vashisth asserted: “After rendering more than five years of service by the workman-petitioner, and the observation made thereon by the tribunal in regard to the illegal action of termination of his service at the instance of the management, this court finds that the relief of reinstatement and continuity in service was not deniable”.

Justice Vashisth added the workman could have earned a significant salary had he continued in job. The court, as such, deemed it appropriate to award onetime compensation of Rs 3 lakh towards all the claims raised through the demand notice, “in light of the total period of service and potential salary revisions etc.”