Occasion for arising industrial dispute.

This is a petition for the issue of a writ of certiorari to call for the records in Industrial Dispute No.23 of 1952, before the Industrial Tribunal, Madras and the Labour Appellate Tribunal on appeal therefrom and to quash the proceedings thereof.

The petition arises out of a dispute between a cinema concern by name the Odeon Cinema and certain workmen of the Sagar Talkies, represented by the ‘South Indian Cinema Employees’ Association. The facts giving rise to this dispute are as follows:-

In premises No.8(a) in Woods Road, Royapettah, the owners of the building thereon were carrying on a cinema business under the name of Sagar Talkies having fitted it up with the furniture, talkies equipment, electrical machinery, etc. They had on their rolls a number of workmen, who are collectively the first respondents in this writ petition. While so a firm by name Ishwaradas Sahni and Brothers, who are carrying on the business of running cinemas in several places in India under the name of Odeon Cinema, approached the owners of these premises for a lease of the building to enable them to conduct their own cinema business in the said place. The negotiations were started towards the end of March, 1952 and finally resulted in an agreement for a lease, under which the owners of the theatre building agreed to lease the premises and its equipment to Messrs. Ishwaradas Sahni and Brothers for a period of five years with a covenant for renewal for a further period of five years. It was part of the agreement that the owners of the buildings should get transferred to their lessee the electrical licence as well as the licence under the Cinematograph Act for the purpose of conducting the cinema, and this was made a condition precedent to the agreement of lease becoming operative. A formal lease deed was finally executed on 3rd May, 1952, to be effective as and from 1st May, 1952 and under the terms thereof Rs.25,000 was paid to the lessors as security for the proper return of the equipment and accessories and the lessees agreed to pay a rent of Rs.4,250 per mensem for the building and the premises and the hire of the furniture, electrical fittings, machinery, and cinema equipment, etc., out of this sum of Rs.4,250, Rs.2,000 was allocated as rent for the premises, Rs.1,000 as hire for the furniture and Rs.1,250 as hire for the machinery and electrical fittings. There are other terms and conditions in the lease of these buildings and equipment, but it is unnecessary to set them out as none of them have any bearing or relevance to the matters arising for consideration, in this writ petition.

In accordance with the terms of the agreement the lessors intimated to the Commissioner of Police the fact of their entering into this lease and requesting that the electrical certificate and the licence might be transferred to the name of the lessees and these were got transferred.

The lessees effected some repairs and alterations to the structure of the theatre, after their entry into possession of the demised premises on 3rd May, 1952 and started their business on and from 22nd June, 1952, Meanwhile on 1st May, 1952, a list of the staff, who were till then in the employ of the lessors was handed over to the lessees and on 3rd May, 1952, it is stated that these members of the previous staff were introduced to the lessees at the theatre premises. The lessees, according to their case, intimated to the workers previously in the employ of the lessors that they would absorb into their service as many as were needed by them for their business, and they called upon the staff to apply to them for employment. This gave rise to some misapprehensions on the part of the workmen and some of the workers addressed the lessees a letter on 13th May, 1952, in which they informed these lessees that the lessors had been giving out that the service of the entire staff have been transferred to the lessees, and requesting that their service might be continued with the existing pay,