Judgment

ORDER:- This petition for special leave is against the judgment dated 2-9-1987 of the High Court of Madhya Pradesh dismissing the petitioners writ petition (M.P. No. 3308 of 1985 (reported in 1988 MPLJ 85). The petitioners demand regularisation of their services claiming to be daily-rated workmen for a long time in the mines of the Diamond Mining Project, Panna of the National Mineral Development Corporation Ltd. Their demands are of regularisation and "equal pay for equal work" on the ground that they are discharging the same duties as the regular workers. The management has throughout denied the petitioners claim and alleged that, in fact, the petitioners have been continued on rolls on humanitarian grounds for several years, even though there is no work for them; and as such, there is no question of regularising the petitioners and giving them the pay of regular workers when in fact they are not doing any work for a long time.

2. The High Court rejected the petitioners claim and came to the following conclusion (1988 MPLJ 85 at p. 89):

"The petitioners are not regular employees, they do not have any specific job to do, they are surplus to the establishment and merely kept