KAN SINGH, J.—This is a writ petition under Art. 226 of the Constitution by the Rajasthan State Electricity Boards hereinafter to be referred as the "Board" and is directed against two orders of the Labour Court; the first one dated 9.7.62 (Ex-O), and the second one dated 1.8.62 (Ex-Q), by which, on applications made by respondents Narsanghlal and Dwarka Prasad workmen in an undertaking of the Board, under sec. 33(c) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, hereinafter to be referred as the "Act", the Labour Court ordered the Board to pay retrenchment compensation to these respondents.

2. The petitioner Board is a public undertaking for the purpose of generation and supply of electricity in the State of Rajasthan and has its power houses at various places. It maintains a power house at Bikaner also. Prior to the formation of Rajasthan the power house at Bikaner was run by the ex-Bikaner State as a State department and on formation of Rajasthan the State of Rajasthan continued to maintain the power house as a departmental undertaking. Sometime in 1957 the Board was constituted as a body corporate and the power houses were taken over by the Board. The employees of the State in these departmental undertaking became the employees of the Board consequent to the transfer of the undertakings to the Board. According to the writ petition, the respondents Nos. 2 and 3, who were employed at the power house when the former Bikaner State was in existence, came to be retired from 8.10.1948. After the retirement they were again re-employed by the State on work-charge basis. The Board did not like to continue old persons in employment as that would adversely affect the efficiency of the undertaking. The Chief Engineer of the Board, therefore, directed, as a matter of policy, that the services of all employees above the age of 60 years should be dispensed with. The case of the Board is that on 10.6.60 the Chief Engineer directed the Executive Engineers to dispense with the services of all such employees forthwith and consequently by orders Ex-C and Ex-D, the Executive Engineer of the Board at Bikaner terminated the services of the respondents Nos. 2 and 3, with effect from the afternoon of 8.7.1960 in the case of Dwarka Prasad, and from the after-noon of 15.7.1960 in the case of Narsangh Lal. The respondents Nos. 2 and 3 then filed separate applications before the Labour Court under sec. 33(c) of the Act. They asserted by these applications that in retrenching them the Board had not followed the provisions of law and in particular retrenchment compensation had not been paid to them as required by sec. 25(f) of the Act. They, therefore, claimed retrenchment compensation and one months notice pay. The applications were opposed before the Labour Court by the Board an the ground that the Labour Court had no jurisdiction to deal with the matter as the services of the respondents were terminated as a matter of general policy for the reason that they were old and infirm employees and had been reemployed on work-charge basis after their due retirement and consequently it should not be postulated that they were retrenched employees within the meaning of the Act. It was further contended before the Labour Court on behalf of the Board that sec. 33(C) of the Act did not empower that Court to entertain a claim of the nature put forth by respondents Nos. 2 and 3. Under that section the Labour Court could not adjudicate or determine whether the respondents had any right to receive retrenchment compensation, as, according to the Board, the Labour Court could only deal with the question of computation of the retrenchment benefits if the right to receive such benefits is established elsewhere before a competent forum. The orders of the Labaur Court are thus assailed on the following main grounds:—

(1) That the Labour Court has acted without jurisdiction in entertaining the claim. The services of the petitioners, according to the Board, were simply terminated on acco

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