GAJENDRAGADKAR, J. - (1.) THE short question which arises for our decision in these two appeals to whether the domestic enquiry held by the appellant, Saran Motors (Private). Ltd., against two of its employees, Vishwanath and Saran Singh, was vitiated by the fact that the enquiry officer began and conducted the enquiry With a bias against the employees and in favour of the appellant and whether his conclusions suffer from the vice that they are not supported by any evidence and can be characterized as perverse.
(2.) THE present proceedings began with two applications made by the two eployees under S.33A of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (14 of 1947). By their applications, the two employees alleged that they had been dismissed from service by the appellant in contravention of the provisions of S.33 of the Act. It appears that on 7 March 1960 orders of discharge simpliciter were served by the appellant on the two employees who will be called the two respondents hereafter. The two respondents pleaded that these orders of discharge really amounted to their dismissal and, since, according to them, S. 33 had been contravened, the said orders ought to be set aside. The industrial tribunal which heard these complaints has upheld the respondents case and has directed the appellant to reinstate the respondents and give them consequential reliefs. It is against this order that the present appeals have been brought before us by the appellant by special leave. The incident which ultimately led to the dismissal of the respondents took place on 8 June 1959. The appellant is a private limited company and has a branch in Delhi and it carries on the business of automobile engineers. Respondent 1, Vishwanath, was working with the appellant in the capacity of a technical assistant to the director of the appellant's company while respondent 2, Har Saran Singh, was working as an assistant fitter in the company. On 8 June 1959 both of them had taken leave. Respondent 1 had alleged that he was ill while respondent 2 had stated that his grandfather was ill. The manager, however, suspected that the excuses given by the two respondent were false and that they had been really absenting them-selves from work in order to earn money by taking private work. That is why a kind of raiding party was arranged by the management consisting of the manager, Sri Bhardwaj, and Sri Madan Gopal. These persons engaged a taxi and went to the compound of Sir Ganga Ram Hospital. There they found Vishwanath was working on a car No. DLS 2512 (Hillman) belonging to Sardar Atma Singh and Har Saran Singh was working on a car No. DLG 4917 belonging to Dr. Thakur Dass. Both these owners were customers of the appellant. Having seen that the respondents had absented themselves on false pretexts and had really taken private work, charge-sheets were served on them and the same were followed by a domestic enquiry. At the enquiry, evidence was led both by the appellant and the respondents. Sri Chadha who held the enquiry found against the reepondents and accepted the appellant's case, on receiving his report, the appellant passed the impugned orders of discharge against the two respondents.Before industrial tribunal it was urged by the respondents that the enquiry held by Sri Chadha was unfair and his conclusions were perverse. The appellant denied these allegations and contended that the enquiry was fair and the tribunal had no jurisdiction to consider the correctness or propriety of the findings recorded by the enquiry officer. The tribunal has accepted the respondents' contention and has made the awards which have given rise to these two appeals.
(3.) THE first question which we have to decide is whether the tribunal was justified in holding that Sri Chadha has a bias in favour of the appellant, and so, was incompetent to hold the enquiry. It appears that Sri Chadha is sometimes engaged by the appellant as a lawyer in industrial matters and the respondents' case was that he had been entrusted with the work of holding such enquiries on four or five occasions. It is on these grounds that the tribunal has held that Sri Chadha was not competent to hold the present enquiry.;