( 1 ) BY instituting Special Civil Application No. 10225 of 1996 under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, Steel Authority of India Limited ["sail" for short] has prayed to issue a writ of certiorari to quash award and order dated November 8, 1996 rendered by the Industrial Tribunal, Ahmedabad, in Reference (IT) No. 190 of 1993, by which SAIL is directed to treat 160 workmen working in the stockyard located at Kaligam, Sabarmati, Ahmedabad as its permanent employees, and pay them salary, dearness allowance and other benefits as per the Rules and Regulations of the Company from the date of making of the reference i. e. from July 31, 1993. Special Civil Application No. 2643 of 1997 is filed by Gujarat Mazdoor Panchayat under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, wherein prayer made is to declare that the workmen employed in the stockyard located at Kaligam, Sabarmati, Ahmedabad are entitled to salary, dearness allowance and other benefits as per Rules and Regulations of SAIL from January 1, 1980 with 18% interest on the arrears to be paid to the workmen and not from July 31, 1993 as directed by the Industrial Tribunal. As both the petitions are directed against common award and order dated November 8, 1996, rendered by the Industrial Tribunal in Reference (IT) No. 190 of 1993, this Court proposes to dispose of them by this common judgment.

( 2 ) STEEL Authority of India Limited is a Government of India Enterprise. It is a Government Company registered under the provisions of the Companies Act, 1956. It is engaged in production and marketing of iron and steel items, such as, angles, bars, coils, wires, rods, looms, billets, iron girders etc. The company has its steel manufacturing plants at Bokaro, Rourkela, Bhilai, Alloy Steel Plant at Durgapur, stainless steel plant at Salem and subsidiaries at Burnpur, Bhadravati and Chandrapura.

( 3 ) THE Central Marketing Organization, which is the marketing unit of SAIL, markets the products manufactured at various steel plants. In order to cater to the demands of its customers, the Central Marketing Organization has established network of stockyards where it receives materials produced by the plants and after receiving the same, stores it and sells the same to its customers. One such stockyard is located at Kaligam, Sabarmati, Ahmedabad.

( 4 ) THE workmen employed in the stockyard are doing work of unloading the materials arriving by rail/road, sorting them out, stacking in the yard and loading the same in the trucks brought by the customers when sale is effected. All the handling operations as also stacking are done as per the stipulations of stacking plans, handling and storage guidelines laid down by SAIL and other instructions issued by stockyard incharge. In the stockyard, 160 labourers are employed and they work in three shifts, duration of each shift being of 8 hours. Cranes, tools and tackles, equipments etc. required to efficiently handle the expected cargo in the yard are also supplied by the Company and they are being operated by labourers. The workers employed in the stockyard are members of Gujarat Mazdoor Panchayat, which is the sole bargaining agent on behalf of the workmen employed at SAILs stockyard located at Kaligam, Sabarmati, Ahmedabad.

( 5 ) THE case of SAIL is that having regard to the liberalised imports as well as competition from private sectors and unsteady supply of materials from manufacturing plants, it is not in a position to maintain regular, systematic or permanent labour force for its handling operations carried out at stockyards, and enters into a contract with a handling contractor capable of handling iron and steel materials at the stockyard, who engages his own labourers and handles steel materials on the terms and conditions stipulated in the contract. What is maintained by SAIL is that the contract, inter alia, stipulates that the handling contractor has to comply with the provisions of the Contract Labour (Regulations and