An employee who worked as an Apprentice for a limited period may not be entitled to reinstatement as a regular employee with regular wages, and instead, the court may direct the employer to provide compensation.

ORDER :

1. The present appeal has been filed against the judgment and order dated 04.07.2006 passed by the Learned Single Judge of the High Court of Judicature at Allahabad whereby the Writ Petition filed by the appellant-Corporation herein was disposed of directing that from 04.07.2006, the respondent-workman shall receive from the employer regular wages as Typist, that is to say, that he shall be paid by the appellant-Corporation salary as Typist which was being paid to other Typists at that time in the appellant-Corporation.

2. We have heard learned counsel for the parties. From the documents on record, we find that the respondent was appointed as an Apprentice, that too firstly from 06.03.1987 on consolidated wages of Rs.500/- which appointment continued by different orders till 17.05.1988, where after he ceased to work.

3. The respondent-workman raised an industrial dispute and the Labour Court, Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh vide Award dated 17.01.1998 directed the appellant-Corporation to reinstate the respondent on the post on which he was working without any back wages. The Award was challenged by the appellant-Corporation before the High Court and as mentioned above the High Court while disposing of the Writ Petition directed the appellant-Corporation to employ the respondent on regular wages as a Typist from 04.07.2006.

4. The contention of learned counsel for the appellant-Corporation is that as the respondent-workman was employed as an Apprentice for about one year and two months only, the High Court has erred in law in directing the appellant-Corporation to appoint him as a Typist and he was not entitled for the salary of a Typist. At best, he could have been given some compensation.

5. For supporting his contention, learned counsel for the appellant-Corporation placed reliance upon two decisions of this Court being Senior Superintendent Telegraph (Traffic), Bhopal v. Santosh Kumar Seal and Ors., (2010) 6 SCC 773 and In-charge Officer and Anr. v. Shankar Shetty, (2010) 9 SCC 126 in which this Court has held that the proper course would be not to direct for the reinstatement but to award compensation where the employee had worked for a period of one year to seven years intermittently, as the case may be.

6. However, learned counsel for the respondent-workman submitted that even though in terms of the order dated 07.01.2008 passed by this Court, the respondent was to continue to work in terms of the interim order passed by the High Court but that order was not given effect to by the appellant-Corporation and, therefore, the respondent is entitled for full back wages of a regular Typist.

7. We have given our thoughtful consideration to the rival submissions made by the parties. We are of the considered opinion that as the respondent had worked for a period of only one year and two months and that too as an Apprentice, even though not under the Apprenticeship Act, 1961 he cannot be given reinstatement and that too on the wages of a regular Typist.

8. In the interest of justice, as held by this Court in the aforesaid two decisions, we feel it fit and proper to direct the appellant-Corporation to give some compensation which we quantify at Rs.2.5 lakhs to be paid to the respondent-workman within a period of one month.

9. Accordingly, the impugned order of the High Court is set aside.

10. The Civil Appeal is disposed of in terms of the above order.