C.M.VAIDIALINGAM, J.

(1) THIS appeal, by special leave, is directed against the order dated 21/03/1967 of the Delhi Administration Special Industrial tribunal, dismissing the application filed by the appellant under S. 33(1) (b) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (hereinafter to be referred as the Act, for grant of permission to dismiss the four employees.

(2) THE appellant is a Public Limited Company owning Textile Mill, called "Delhi Cloth Mills" (D. C. M.) in Bai a Hindu Rao, Delhi. The respondents were the workmen employed in the Mills. The appellant also owns another Textile Mill called "Swatantra Bharat Mills" situated at Najafgarh Road, Delhi.

(3) A dispute arose in the later part of 1965 between the employees and the appellant regarding the payment of bonus for the year 1964-65. Negotiations for settling the rate of bonus for the year ending 30/06/1965, however, failed on 16/02/1966. As the period prescribed under the Payment of Bonus Act for payment of bonus for the accounting year was drawing near, the appellant on February 21, 1966 declared bonus at 6% of the Annual Wages. The actual disbursement of bonus was to commence on the afternoon of 22/02/1966. However, the Union exhorted the workmen not to accept the bonus declared by the appellant, which resulted in the workmen refusing to receive the bonus and going on strike in the afternoon of 23/02/1966. According to the appellant, the strike was followed by serious acts of violence and destruction of property on 23/02/1966 and thereafter. This resulted in the appellant declaring a lock-out in the mills on the evening of 24/02/1966, as according to the appellant the strike was illegal and the employees had turned violent. Ultimately, the entire dispute relating to the payment of bonus and the justification for the strike as well as the lock-out were referred to the Special Industrial tribunal by the Delhi Administration by Reference dated 4/03/1966.

(4) ACCORDING to the appellant, during the period of the strike serious and extensive damage had been committed by some of the employees by forcibly entering the office of the Spinning A. Department of the Mills on the night between February 23/24, 1966 at 1.30 a.m. The employees acting in concert broke open the almirah kept in the said Department and destroyed the records, spare parts and furniture etc. According to the appellant, it received three reports Exs. M-32 to M-34 from the employees of the Spinning A Department of the Mills, regarding the violent activities of some of the workmen and the destruction of property done by them. In particular, names of four employees, who were working in the said Department were mentioned as persons who had taken part in the rioting ana destruction of the property of the Mills, Those employees were: (1) Rati Ram; (2) Bhoop Singh; (3) Hari Chand; and (4) Ganesh Dutt. The three persons who had sent reports Exs. M-32 to M-34 have given evidence in the domestic inquiry. We will only advert to the report Ex. M-32 made by Kundan Lal which was as follows:

"To

THE Spinning Master,

A-Mill.

IT is respectfully submitted that 1/02/1966 at 10 oclock in the night came to the Mill by the Mill Gate and on reaching inside, came to know that the Mill was closed and on that I tried to get out but the works standing at the gate stopped me. I helplessly came back to my khata and took a seat in the next to yours where many other workers as also Babu Desh Raj were already present. At about 1.30 in the night, noises of destruction, etc. came to be heard from the office room. I went running there and saw many workers indulging in destruction. On my asking as to why they were breaking the almirah etc. and scattering things on the floor and destroying documents, books etc. those people started abusing me. When I snatched an iron-bar from the hands of one of the workers, he slapped me. I then took away a set of keys a set of (sic) from another worker. J