AKSHAY H. MEHTA, J.

( 1 ) ALL the three petitions involved common questions of fact as well as law and hence they are being disposed of by this common judgment.

( 2 ) NAVSARI Cotton and Silk Mills Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as the Company) petitioner of Special Civil Application No. 6445 of 2001 was incorporated under the provisions of the Indian Companies Act in the year 1936. It had the composite textile unit at navsari having 33,536 spindles and processing capacity of 5,000 meters per day. Some time before the year 1990 the Company faced financial difficulties and ultimately it became sick industrial company within the meaning of section 3 (O) of the Act. A reference was made to the Board for Industrial and Financial reconstruction (for short bifr) under the provisions of Section 15 of the Sick Industrial companies (Special Provisions) Act, 1985 (hereinafter referred to as the Act ). A scheme came to be prepared whereby modernization of the plant and machinery with an estimated cost of Rs. 113 lacs was envisaged. Though the scheme was expected to be completed in the month of March 1992, it got delayed by four years. During that period the financial condition of the Company further deteriorated and the working thereof became unviable. It stopped its operations in July 1994 and had remained closed till the time new scheme came to be prepared and implemented. The reason for the Companys debacle was the increase in the cost of raw materials, lack of cost control by the erstwhile management and the unviable operations of the weaving and processing sections. The accumulated losses of the company as on March 31, 1995 had mounted upto Rs. 1358 lacs. Since the earlier sanctioned scheme failed, the BIFR again directed the operating agency, namely the Industrial development Bank of India (IDBI) to advertise seeking offers for take over/merger and to procure promoters for that purpose and also to explore the possibility of securing financial aid from the financial institutions. In response to the said advertisement Shri Morarji Desai textile Labour Co-op. Industries Ltd. (for short smdt) - the petitioner of Special Civil application No. 6443 of 2001, proposed a scheme. It is a co-operative formed for the revival of the Company and to implement the scheme for the same. The said co-operative is formed by Majoor Mahajan Mandal, Navsari i. e. the petitioner of Special Civil Application no. 6446 of 2001 under the provisions of the gujarat Co-operative Societies Act. The property belonging to Majoor Mahajan Mandal has been mortgaged to GSFC for the purpose of obtaining loan of Rs. 50 lacs for depositing the equity share capital of Rs. 1. 00 crore before the IDBI under the scheme. At present the company has been revived under the scheme sanctioned by the BIFR and the said scheme is under operation and implementation. The IDBI is the operating agency and the BIFR is periodically monitoring and reviewing the working of the scheme. The respondent joined the service of the Company on August 1, 1959 as Office Clerk and his service came to be terminated by passing order of dismissal by the company on June 27, 1982. This was done pursuant to an incident of theft in which the respondent was involved. He was, therefore, issued with a charge-sheet dated June 2, 1982 and having found him guilty the Company took the aforesaid action. Being aggrieved by the order of dismissal from the service, the respondent approached the Labour Court, Navsari by filing T. Application No. 449/1983. Initially the said proceedings were filed against the company alone. However, later on when the SMDT took over the Company under the scheme, it was joined as opposite party in the said T. Application. It may be noted here that during the pendency of these proceedings the respondent, upon reaching the age of superannuation on July 8, 1991 had retired from service. The labour Court vide award dated July 23, 1999 directed the SMDT to pay full back wages to the respondent from

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