The Industrial Tribunal has jurisdiction to implead the Government as a party to an industrial dispute, but the Government is not a necessary or a proper party if the dispute does not involve any rights or liabilities of the Government.

ORDER :- By G.O. Ms. No. 2310 dated 16-5-1953, the Government of Madras, in pursuance of the-powers conferred upon them by S. 10(1)(c), Industrial Disputes Act (Central Act 14 of 1947) referred to a special Industrial Tribunal for adjudication the disputes between the workers of the 65 textile mills enumerated in the schedule to the said G.O. and the management of the said Mills with regard to compensation for involuntary unemployment caused to the workers and while the proceedings regarding the adjudication of the disputes were going on, the petitioner, which is, one of the mills mentioned in the schedule applied to the Industrial Tribunal to summon and implead the Government of Madras as a party to the proceedings. This application was resisted on behalf of the workers and therefore the Tribunal had to consider the application on the merits.

2. Two points were raised before the tribunal and they were (1) whether the Tribunal has jurisdiction to implead the Government as a party; and (2) if it has jurisdiction, whether the Government are a necessary or a proper party. On the first question the finding was that the tribunal has the power to summon and add as a party any person whose presence the tribunal deems necessary for a proper adjudication of the dispute. On the second question the tribunal found that the Government of Madras were neither a necessary nor a proper party. The application, was therefore dismissed.

3. On the first question a recent decision of this Court reported in - P.G. Brookes v. Industrial Tribunal Madras, AIR 1954 Mad 369 (A), held that S. 18(b). Industrial Disputes Act necessarily implies that parties other than the original parties to an industrial dispute can be summoned as parties to the proceeding. Therefore by necessary implication there is vested in the industrial tribunal a power to add any person or establishment whose presence is necessary or proper for the due and just adjudication of the dispute and make them parties to the proceeding. Clause (b) of S. 18, when it speaks of "all other parties summoned to appear in the proceedings" as parties to the dispute, necessarily implies that some persons other than the original parties to the dispute or persons whom the State Government has subsequently added under S. 10(5), can also be summoned in order that the award may become enforceable and binding on those parties also.

If the intention of the legislature had been to restrict the scope of the enquiry and the award only to the employers and the employees or similar persons added by the State Government under S. 10(5), then S. 18(b) would be a surplusage because when once the tribunal is given authority to summon other parties to appear in the proceedings, it means there is a wide discretion vested in the tribunal to have before it persons or institutions other than those originally intended by the Government or who are added by the Government. In my view S. 18, Cl. (b) gives sufficient authority to the tribunal for the addition of parties. It is similar to O. 1, R. 10(2), Civil P.C., where the Court may, at any stage of the proceedings, either upon or without the application of either party, order that the name of any person, whose presence before the Court may be necessary in order to enable the Court effectually and completely to adjudicate upon and settle all the questions involved in the suit, be added as a party. The view taken by the learned Judges in - AIR 1954 Mad 369 (A) cited above is to the same effect and is binding on me.

4. Mr. Rajagopala Aiyangar appearing on behalf of the petitioner also laid stress on similar provisions contained in the Representation of the People Act of 1951 and the powers of a tribunal appointed to try election petitions to add parties to the election dispute. Under S. 82 of that Act, a petitioner questioning the election of a person returned shall join as respondents to his petition all candidates who were duly nominated at the election other than himse