INDIA TYRE AND RUBBER CO INDIA PRIVATE LTD Vs. THEIR WORKMEN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner company manufactures and 'bella tyres, among other rubber goods, in India. It has its head office at Bombay. One of its branch offices is at Madras with jurisdiction over the territorial area known as Madras district. The district extends over areas which lie outside the State, in Kerala, Mysore and Andhra Pradesh. The sub-depots at Ernakulam, Bangalore and Vijayawada are within the district of Madras.

(2.) ON the recommendation of the Tariff Commission in 1953 the Government of India ordered a reduction in the sale price of tyres by 10 per cent. The Tariff Commission pointed out in its report that the proportion of administration, selling and distribution expenses of the petitioner company was high, when compared with such charges incurred by other companies manufacturing and selling tyres in India. The petitioner company reorganized its methods of business, which resulted in a reduction in the amount of office work to be done in the Madras office. The petitioner found that to deal with the work oil the reorganized basis twelve out of the 33 employees in the Madras office were in surplus of its requirements. On 22 February 1966 the petitioner company ordered a retrenchment of twelve of its employees and served each of the retrenched employees with a notice, paying each of them a month's wages in lieu of notice:

(3.) THE workers' union challenged the right of the management to terminate the services of these twelve employees. On 31 March 1956, the dispute between the management and the workers was referred by the Government of Madras, under Section 10 (1) (c) of the Industrial Disputes Act, for adjudication by the industrial tribunal, Madras. What was referred as an industrial dispute was: Whether the retrenchment of the following twelve workers is justified and to what relief they are entitled? The names of the twelve workers were then listed.