JUDGMENT :

1. All these writ petitions filed under Art. 226 of the Constitution of India are concerning the right of the employees in the cotton textile industry in the local area of Mumbai to work up to the age of 63 years. These petitions are filed either by the textile mill/company or by the employees concerned challenging the orders passed by the Industrial Court constituted under the Maharashtra Recognition of Trade Unions and Prevention of Unfair Labour Practices Act, 1971 (MRTU and PULP Act, for short) on the complaints filed by these employees against these mill companies invoking items (1), (5), (9) and (10) Sch. IV of the said Act. It is therefore, that all these petitions have been directed to be heard together and are accordingly being decided together.

2. The Bombay Industrial Relations Act, 1946, governs the relationship between the employers and the employees engaged in this cotton textile industry. Under Chap. VII of this Act, Standing Orders are required to be framed governing various industrial matters mentioned in Sch. 1 to that Act. The age of retirement or superannuation is item 13 in that schedule. As far as cotton textile industry is concerned, there are separate Standing Orders governing separate categories of employees. Thus mere are Standing Orders for a category of employees which is known as “Operatives” and mere are separate Standing Orders for another category of employees designated as clerks. The Standing Orders presently in vogue for operatives, have been settled and finalised by the Industrial Court under S. 36(3) of the B.L.R. Act. 1946. The provision with respect to retirement of operatives is seen in Standing Order 20A It reads as follows.

“20A. An operative shall retire from service on attaining the age of 60 years, but a male operative shall be retained in service, if he continues to be efficient, up to the age of 63 years, provided mat when retrenchment becomes necessary a person who has completed the age of 60 may be retired in preference to younger men”

3. As far as clerks are concerned. Standing Order 11A governs the age of retirement of clerks. It reads as follows:

“11A. Any employee shall retire from service on attaining the age of 60 years, but a male employee shall be retained in service, if he continues to be efficient up to the age of 63 years, provided that when retrenchment becomes necessary, an employee who has completed the age of 60 may be retired in preference to younger men.”

The Standing Orders for the clerks are also similarly settled by the Industrial Court under S. 36(3) of the said Act. Thus as can be seen the provisions for retirement of operatives and clerks as settled under the two different Standing Orders under S. 36(3) of the B.I.R. Act, 1946 are identical.

4. The question with respect to interpretation of these Standing Orders first came up before a Single Judge of this Court (Hon'ble Justice Smt. Sujata V. Manohar, when she was in this Court) in the case of Maharashtra State Textile Corporation, Ltd. v. Vasudev Vinayak Joshi reported in 1990 (1) L.L.N. 191. In that matter, respondent 1 had worked as a jobber (a category specifically included amongst the operatives) in a textile mill belonging to the petitioner-Corporation. He was sought to be retired on attaining the age of 60 years and he, therefore, filed a complaint under the MRTU and PULP Act, 1971, which came to the allowed. It was against that order that the Corporation had approached this Court.

5. The learned Single Judge noted that mere were three parts of this Standing Order (concerning the operatives) which were as follows:

(1) An operative shall retire from service on attaining the age of 60 years.

(2) A male operative shall be retained in service after the age of 60 years, if he continues to be efficient up to the age of 63 years.

(3) When retrenchment becomes necessary, a person who has completed the a