- (1.) This Judgment will dispose of Civil Appeal Nos. 1269, 1270, 1271 and 1272 of 2007. Civil Appeal No. 1269 of 2007 is preferred by Officers' Association of Indian Airlines; the representative body of the Indian Airlines employees. The Civil Appeal No. 1270 of 2007 is preferred by Indian Airlines Cabin Crew Association while Civil Appeal No. 1271 of 2007 is preferred by Vayudoot Karamchari Sangh and Civil Appeal No. 1272 of 2007 by Indian Airlines Officers' Welfare Forum respectively. All these appeals challenge a common judgment passed by the Division Bench of the Delhi High Court whereby the Division Bench has set aside the common judgment passed by the Ld. Single Judge of that Court which had allowed the four Writ petitions filed by the Officers' Association of the Indian Airlines and the employees of the Vayudoot Limited.
(2.) The learned Single Judge in his judgment had dealt with four writ petitions filed and had granted the relief in the following terms : "Rule is made absolute. Decision of the respondents to offer merger to SHOD employees by placing them at the bottom of the seniority list of the post held by them after the existing employees of Indian Airlines is quashed. Notification dated 05.02.2001 is quashed. Notification dated 05.02.2001 requiring SHOD employees to exercise option in terms of the first notification dated 05.02.2001 is also quashed. Directions are issued to Indian Airlines and the Union of India to re-frame the policy of cadre merger by assessing and determining the equation of posts by taking into consideration the four guiding factors laid down by the Supreme Court in Chanderkant Anant Kulkarni's case and in light of the observations made by me in the present decision."
(3.) This direction was upset by the impugned judgment of the Division Bench whereby the Division Bench has set aside the whole judgment and allowed LPA nos. 646 to 649 of 2004, all writ appeals were filed by Indian Airlines Corporation. The Division Bench by the same judgment also dismissed one LPA No. 382 of 1999 filed by the Vayudoot employees. FACTS : Indian Airlines Ltd. and Air India came to be established under the Air Corporations Act, 1953. Vayudoot Pvt. Ltd. was incorporated in 1982. Vayudoot was converted into a Public Ltd. Company in 1983 and its shares were held by Indian Airlines and Air India jointly. The Government of India took a decision on 25th May, 1993 to merge Vayudoot with Indian Airlines. Some salient features of that decision were : (i) Vayudoot should be merged with Indian Airlines instead of retaining the present form of joint ownership by Indian Airlines and Air India. (ii) The dues owed by Vayudoot to creditors in the public sector on the date of take-over by Indian Airlines would remain frozen for five years. There will thus be a moratorium for five years on repayment and servicing of the dues; thereafter the liabilities will be discharged by Indian Airlines in 10 annual instalments. (iii) Equity shares of Vayudoot Limited held by Air India will be transferred in favour of Indian Airlines on a token consideration. (iv) Vayudoot will be retained as a clearly identifiable separate Division of Indian Airlines.;