- (1.) IN this Rule the petitioner prays for quashing an order of reference made by the State of West Bengal of an industrial dispute for adjudication by the second Industrial Tribunal.
(2.) THE facts as stated in the petition briefly are : Upon a Charter of demands submitted to the petitioner which is a limited company through the respondent No. 4, Oriental Metal majdoor Association, a registered trade union, there was an agreement on 28th march, 1961 between the petitioner and its workmen whereby the industrial dispute so raised relating amongst other things to pay and workers' allowances and other disputes was settled. Subsequently, by another agreement on march 12, 1962 the award of the Third omnibus Engineering Tribunal (referred to as Engineering Tribunal) was accepted concerning grades, scales and dearness allowance of the operatives viz. , un-skilled semi-skilled, skilled and high skilled with effect from 1st february, 1962.
(3.) THEREAFTER, another dispute was raised on identical items by a separate trade union, Oriental Metal Industries majdoor Union, the respondent No. 3. After exchange of several letters ultimately there was another agreement on June 5, 1963. The disputes so raised were settled between the petitioner and the respondent No. 3 concerning inter alia the dearness allowance payable to the workmen to bring it in line with the award of Engineering tribunal with retrospective effect. There was another agreement between the respondent No. 3 and the petitioner in a conference before the Labour commissioner under which the dearness allowance of the workmen concerned was agreed to be paid at an enhanced rate of Rs. 5/- with effect from April 1964 with certain other conditions. In spite of these facts the respondent No. 3 tried to raise an industrial dispute complaining of non-implementation of 1962 agreements and for fixation of dearness allowance by the Tribunal before the State government which was refused.;