V. RAMASUBRAMANIAN, J.

Aggrieved by a common order passed by the learned Judge directing the management of ONGC to regularize the services of persons, who had completed 240 days of service in a period of 12 months, after their appointments on tenure basis in the year 2008, together with notional benefits, the management of ONGC has come up with 24 writ appeals. The 25th writ appeal (W.A. No. 285/2017) is filed by an individual, who applied for appointment to a post in ONGC, pursuant to the recruitment notification issued in September, 2014. His dream is that if hundreds of workers are deprived of the benefit of regularization, he will get appointment. Apart from these 25 writ appeals, there are 4 writ petitions, which were left out of the batch of cases disposed of by the learned Judge and hence they are also tagged along with the writ appeals.

2. Heard Mr. B. Adinarayana Rao, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the appellant/ management in 24 writ appeals Mr. K.R.K.V. Prasad, learned Counsel appearing for the appellant in one writ appeal and Mr. C.V. Mohan Reddy, learned Senior Counsel, Mr. Vedula Venkata Ramana, learned Senior Counsel and Mr. A. Satyaprasad, learned Senior Counsel appearing for the respondents. We have also heard Mr. Dasari S.V.V.S.V. Prasad and Mr. Rama Mohan Palanki, learned counsel appearing for the petitioners in the writ petitions.

3. The respondents in the writ appeals, filed by the management, were originally engaged as Field Operators through private contractors on contract basis from the year 1994/1995 or so. Raising certain demands on behalf of these contract labourers, the ONGC Contract Workers Union served a strike notice on 06-11-1996. Subsequently, three more strike notices were issued on 16-07-1997, 03-10-1997 and 20-10-1997, demanding the recognition of the contract workers as the employees of the ONGC.

4. The strike commenced on 04-11-1997 and continued up to 28-11-1997, leading to a meeting being organised between the representatives of the management, office bearers of their union and also the Local Member of Parliament and the local Member of Legislative Assembly. In the meeting held on 11-10-1997, an understanding was reached between the management and the trade union, to organise these workers into Cooperative Societies and to engage their services through these Cooperative Societies. It was also agreed that the Cooperative Societies so formed will enter into agreements with the management under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 and that the agreement so reached will be operative from 01-01-1998 for a period of 5 years.

5. Immediately, after the expiry of the initial period of 5 years, another meeting was held on 12-01-2003 between the representatives of the management and the representatives of the Cooperative Societies, for chalking out the future course. It was agreed in the said meeting that the existing contracts with some of those Cooperative Societies will stand terminated with effect from 01-01-2003 and that fresh contracts will be entered into between the societies and the ONGC for a period of 5 years with effect from 01-01-2003. It is was further agreed in the said meeting that the members of the Cooperative Societies, who were academically/technically qualified in the areas of their assignments (I.T.I., Diploma, Competency Certificate, Certificate in Fire Fighting, Degree, Post Graduation etc., from recognized Universities/Institutions) may be taken up for consideration from existing semi-skilled to skilled categories. It was also agreed that ONGC will create and fill up 60 posts to meet operational requirements and to start the process of recruitment immediately. The process of recruitment in the second phase was agreed to be initiated in January, 2004 and it was agreed that ONGC will make efforts to fill up 60 posts per year totaling to 300 posts in a period of 5 years. ONGC also agreed that the members of the societies, who were found suitable for identified posts as