Judgement

DESAI, J. :- Special leave granted.

2. A trivial dispute disposed of by an eminently just and legally correct order by the Labour Court was unnecessarily interfered with by the Industrial Court, Madhya Pradesh which has forced employees working in a comparatively lower grade to knock at the doors of this Court.

3. Urban Family Planning Clinic (Clinic for short) was set up at 2. for implementation of family welfare schemes of the Government of India in accordance with approved pattern set out in the letter of Ministry of Health dated May 16, 1963. The Chief Medical Officer of the Bhilai Steel Plant was to be the administrative officer for the Clinic, The entire expenditure of the Clinic was met by the Government of India by giving 100 per cent grant though it was stated as a fact that this amount was not brought into the bank account of Bhilai Steel Plant but was deposited in a separate bank account in the State Bank of India under the name and style of Bhilai Steel Plant Urban Family Planning Clinic Grant-in-aid Account. Subsequently on the recommendation of Bureau of Public Enterprises the Clinic was treated as an integral part of the Administration of Bhilai Steel Plant and the employees working in the Clinic were absorbed as employees of the Bhilai Steel Plant effective from February 4, 1976.

4. Smt. Usha Rani Datta and 11 others who were serving as Aaya/Attendants etc. (presumably Class IV employees) moved an application before the Labour Court for a relief that they are being wrongly treated as fresh employees from the date of absorption and that their services since the commencement of employment somewhere in 1964 be treated as continuous for the purpose of gratuity, retrenchment and leave etc. The application was moved in the Labour Court. Durg but it came to be transferred to Labour Court at Raipur.

5. The management of the Bhilai Steel Plant contested the application contending that the Clinic was an independent unit set up by the Government of India and that it was not an integral part of the administration of Bhilai Steel Plant and therefore the services rendered prior to the absorption on February 4, 1976 could not be treated as service under the Bhilai Steel Plant and therefore the application deserves to be dismissed.

6. The learned Presiding Officer of the Labour Court after hearing both sides and taking into consideration "the evidence. produced before it held that the Clinic has hardly any independent existence and that the employees of the Clinic were in reality and for all practical purposes the employees of the Steel Plant. Accordingly the application was allowed and the necessary relief was given.

7. Two revision petitions came to be filed before the Industrial Court at Madhya Pradesh set up under the Madhya Pradesh Industrial Relations Act. One Revision Petition being No. 10/MPIR/81 was filed by the Executive Director, Bhilai Steel Plant questioning the correctness of the decision of the Labour Court. Original applicants before the Labour Court Smt. Usha Rani Datta and others filed a Revision Petition being No. 2/MPIR/81 praying for relief not granted by Labour Court.

8. Both the revision petitions were disposed of by a learned Member of the Industrial Court by a common judgment.

9. Taking up the revision petition of the management it was held that family planning centres were run by different public undertakings and it was started as part of the general policy of the Government of India and even though the entire expenditure of the centre was reimbursed by the Govt. of India, the clinic of the centre could not be said to be an, industry within the meaning of the expression in the Act nor could it be said to be incidental to the main business of the Bhilai Steel Plant. The learned Member further held that the prayer in the application before the Labour Court was that the petitioners before the Labour Court who were formerly employed in the Family Planning Clinic should be given additional and better wage