ORDER :

1. Leave granted.

2. The appellant, a Cooperative Society has filed the present appeals being aggrieved by the common judgment dated 09th January, 2018 passed by the High Court of Kerala at Ernakulam in writ appeals¹ [Writ Appeals Nos. 2484, 2532, 2564, 2569, 2578, 2612, 2613, 2614/2017] preferred by it against the common judgment dated 11th August, 2017² [Writ Petitions Nos. 12126, 12353, 12354, 13469, 13998, 15931, 20085, 20848/2011] passed by the learned Single Judge of the High Court. By the said judgment, the learned Single Judge has directed the Managing Director of the appellant-Society to prepare a list of casual labourers from amongst the writ petitioners as on the date of the judgement and forward it to the Director, Dairy Development Department to consider their claims for regularization in terms of the judgement of this Court in the case of State of Karnataka and Others vs. Umadevi, (2006) 4 SCC 1.

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4. The appellant-Society took a specific plea, both in the writ petitions as also before the Appellate Court that it is Cooperative Society and not a State or any other authority, as contemplated under Article 12 of the Constitution of India and therefore, is not amenable to judicial review. On merits, it was submitted that the judgment in Umadevi (supra) cannot have any application to the facts of the instant case for the reason that the respondents-writ petitioners were not irregular appointees but appointed illegally and therefore, not entitled for regularization.

5. We may note that the respondents-writ petitioners were appointed temporarily on a daily wage basis in terms of the Circulars dated 15th December, 1992 and 10th December, 2010 which stated in clear terms that their appointments were made on a temporary basis and on daily wages on the recommendations by the members of the Society. Some of the relevant stipulations in the Circular dated 15th December, 1992 are extracted herein-below for ready reference:

“(1) Only persons who are members of the member-Societies and their dependants will be considered.

(2) Only one person from one member-Society will be included in the list.

(3) Preference will be given to members of the member-Societies first and only thereafter dependants will be considered.

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(10) Those who are engaged in this manner will not be given any preference for permanent job.”

6. The Circular dated 10th December, 2010 has elaborated in Para 1 that:

“1. Only persons who are members of the member- Societies and their dependants will be considered (Dependants means children of member of Society, wife/husband).”

7. On 29th January, 2011, the appellant-Society issued a Notification inviting applications for regular recruitment to several posts including the post of Plant Attender, Grade-III. It is not in dispute that the nature of work being undertaken by the respondents was that of Plant Attenders which is the lowest post in that category. Aggrieved by the aforesaid notification, the respondents filed a writ petition in the High Court praying inter alia for quashing of the notification and for issuing directions to the appellant-Society to regularize them on the post of Plant Attenders in their establishment and further, not to alter the conditions of their service pending the conciliation of disputes raised by them.

8. We have specifically inquired from Mr. Kaleeswaram Raj, learned counsel for the respondents as to whether the respondents had subsequently invoked the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947³ [For short ‘the ID Act’] after the conciliation proceedings had failed and sought a reference of their dispute to the Competent authority. He submits that in view of the exigencies of the situation, where the appellant-Society had issued a notification inviting applications for appointments to the subject posts, the respondents were left with no other alternative but to invoke Article 226 of the Constitution of India and file a writ petition before the High C