The main legal point established in the judgment is the application of res judicata in employment disputes and the relevance of delay in approaching the industrial adjudicator.

ORDER :

The present Writ Petition is filed under Article 226 of Constitution of India for the following relief/s :

“…to issue a writ, order or direction more particularly one in the nature of writ of Certiorari calling for the records of the 2nd respondent Central Government Industrial Tribunal-cum-Labour Court at Hyderabad pertaining to its orders dt.08.03.2016 in LCID No.61 off 2010 and to quash the same holding that it is illegal, barred by Res-judicate, without application of mind and was made without adverting to all the earlier litigations before this Hon’ble Court in several repeated writ petitions filed by the applicant before it, which were dismissed on merits and to consequentially direct the 2nd respondent Tribunal to close all further proceedings in the said LCID No.61 of 2010 before it and to pass such other and further order or orders…..”.

2. The present Writ petition came to be filed assailing the order dated 08.03.2016 in L.C.I.D. No.61/2010 to quash the said order as it is illegal and barred by Res-judicata.

3. Facts of the case are like this:

The 1st respondent in the Writ Petition is an employee under the petitioner company which is registered under the Companies Act as Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Limited, known as Visakhapatnam Steel Plant. The 1st respondent herein several times has been admonished and he was censured for several times and still his conduct of absenteeism is continued and due to his incorrigible absenteeism on medical grounds, he was referred to the Chief Medical Officer of the King George Hospital, Visakhapatnam on 03.10.1992. The Medical Officer gave a report that his claims of ill health are false. Accordingly, after constituting a committee and conducting a regular enquiry, a major punishment of removal from service was imposed on 24.12.1992. Against such removal order, the 1st respondent filed an appeal before the Appellate Authority, i.e. Deputy General Manager (Traffic and Raw Materials), who confirmed the punishment vide order dated 08.02.1993. Challenging the order of removal of the Appellate Authority, the 1st respondent herein filed W.P. No.8489 of 1995 before the High Court of Andhra Pradesh at Hyderabad and the said Writ Petition was disposed of by an order dated 16.10.1997 inter alia with a direction to consider the case of the petitioner sympathetically. Pursuant to the said order, the management has once again examined the matter and confirmed the order of removal. On the basis of the said Order in W.P. No.8489 of 1995, the petitioner herein made another representation dated 11.03.2002 and the said representation was considered and rejected. Aggrieved by the said rejection order, the 1st respondent herein filed W.P. No.25176 of 2002 before the High Court of Andhra Pradesh at Hyderabad. The said Writ Petition was dismissed by an Order dated 20.12.2002, observing that the Writ Petitioner is not entitled for consideration of his representation for reemployment which request was already considered and rejected in 1997. The court observed that the writ petitioner does not found any merits. Accordingly, it was dismissed. After dismissal of the Writ Petition, the 1st respondent was kept quiet for a good length of time and again approached the 2nd respondent Tribunal challenging removal order dated 20.04.1992, which was confirmed by appellate authority on 08.02.1993. He challenged the said order after lapse of 8 years from the date of removal of the petitioner herein. The Tribunal after considering the evidence has allowed the dispute by an order dated 08.03.2016 in I.D.L.C. No.61 of 2010 and it was observed that the domestic enquiry conducted in this case is not valid. While disposing the dispute, the employee has been informed to take the help of a co-worker to assist before the enquiry committee and further he would also to be allowed to cross-examine the witnesses present in support of charges leveled against him at the time of concluding the domestic enquiry.

4. Aggrieved by the said orde