V.D.Bhargava, J. - (1.) This is a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution.
(2.) The petitioner is a registered firm carrying on the business of purchasing and selling sugar on a Wholesale scale, and employs three or four munims.
(3.) According to the petitioner, opposite party I had become indebted to the petitioner, and since he had no money to payoff the debt, he requested the petitioner that he be employed as a munim in the firm. He was accordingly employed .on a salary of RS. 150 and It. wag agreed that opposite party would pay off his debt at the rate of RS. 20 per month. Opposite party I in May 1955 himself decided to leave the service and entered as a broker in the Upper India Sugar Exchange, Kanpur. Thereafter, the petitioner received a notice dated 25 July 1955 from opposite party I demanding his salary in lieu of leave. The petitioner by letter dated 28 July 1955 dented all claims of the opposite party. Thereafter one Sri Maqbool Ahmad Khan, general secretary, Transport and General Workers' Union, filed before the Regional Conciliation Officer, Kanpur, an application praying that a conciliation board be constituted for the settlement of the dispute specified in the application. The State Government thereafter referred the matter to Sri J.N. Srivastava, the Additional Regional Conciliation Officer, Kanpur, for adjudication. The petitioner filed a preliminary objection inter alia, taking the plea that the dispute was not an industrial dispute Opposite party 1 filed a written statement and contended that It wan an Industrial dispute. According to the petitioner, opposite party 1 was not a member of any recognized union, and certainly not of the Transport and General Workers' Union, opposite party 2, that the petitioner was not engaged in - transport business and opposite party 2 could not make a common cause with the petitioner. It was further contended by the petitioner that the original order of reference was bad.;