The civil court has jurisdiction to entertain a suit seeking to restrain a domestic enquiry conducted by an employer, and can exercise its inherent power to grant temporary injunction in such a case in the interests of justice.

IMMANENI PANDURANGA RAO, J.

( 1 ) THIS revision is preferred against the order of the learned Subordinate judge, Gudivada in C M A No. 25 of 1990. The facts leading to the filing of the civil revision petition are, briefly, as follows;

( 2 ) DISCIPLINARY action was initiated against six employees of K C P Ltd. Sugar Factory (hereinafter referred to as the factory ) for certain mis-conduct under the standing orders of the factory. It is alleged that the said employees have participated and conducted a hunger strike outside the factory premises; that at the intervention of elders and politicians, the hunger strike was called-off; that the Plant Manager of the factory orally agreed not to victimise the employees but contrary to that assurance, the factory has initiated disciplinary action against them: that the factory has appointed a retired Assistant Commissioner of labour as the enquiry officer and a postgraduate in Labour Laws and a Personnel manager as the presenting officer to represent the management in the enquiry and that when the employees requested the factory management for permission to engage an advocate to represent them in the domestic enquiry, such permission was refused.

( 3 ) THE employees filed O S No. 144 of 1990 on the file of the Court of the District Munsif, Gannavaram for permanent injunction and also I A No. 515 of 1990 for a temporary injunction restraining the defendants from proceeding with the domestic enquiry against the employees without permitting them to engage an advocate to assist them in the disciplinary enquiry.

( 4 ) THE defendants opposed the petition on the ground that if there is any infraction or violation of any rule in the conduct of the enquiry, the employees have to question the same by raising a dispute under the Industrial Disputes act: that the Civil Court has no jurisdiction: that the Civil Court has no power to set aside the order of termination of service nor to intradict the proceedings of the disciplinary enquiry and that the petition for injunction is not maintainable. The learned District Munsif came to the conclusion that this case has to be dealt with either by the Labour Court or by the Industrial Tribunal but not by the civil Court and that where the relief in the suit cannot be granted, interim relief also cannot equally be granted. Accordingly he dismissed the petition.

( 5 ) AGGRIEVED by the said decision, the employees have preferred an appeal in c M A No. 25 of 1990 to the learned subordinate Judge, Gudivada. The learned subordinate Judge held that when the impugned proceedings before the Civil court are not final orders of termination of service but only proceedings initiating an enquiry into the conduct of the employees, the Civil Court has no jurisdiction to intradict those proceedings; that the power of the Civil Court under order 39 of the Code of Civil Procedure cannot be invoked as a supplementary proceedings to adjudicate the claim in the main suit; that when the delinquent employees have got a right to question the final orders of the management, there is no need to interfere with the domestic enquiry proceedings at each and every stage and that is is absolutely unnecessary to intradict the disciplinary proceedings before the enquiry officer initiated by the management. The learned Judge further observed that all the complaints of the employees under the head of natural justice can be heard and decided in the appropriate proceedings challenging the final orders of the management passed on the basis of the enquiry report.

( 6 ) DURING the course of arguments the learned counsel for the petitioners-employees has cited certain decisions in support of his contention that the jurisdiction of the Civil Court is not ousted unless there is a specific bar under a statute and he contended that inasmuch as there is no specific bar for the Civil Court to entertain a suit of this nature, the jurisdiction of the civil court cannot be said to be barred. It is not desirabl

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