ORDER :- In 1927, the Management of the "Hindu" framed various rules defining some of the terms and conditions of service of their employees. One of these was contained in R. 45, which ran :

"Every employee shall ordinarily retire from service on his completing the age of 58 years or thirty years of unbroken service, whichever is earlier."

When the Industrial Employment (Standing Orders) Act, 1946, came into force, the management submitted the rules they had drawn up for certification and on 4th May, 1949, the Labour Commissioner, who is the certifying officer under the Act, certified the rules and they became "standing orders". In 1957, the Management considered it desirable to make certain minor changes in these standing orders and applied for their modification in certain respects.

The National Press Employees Union took advantage of this occasion and moved the certifying officer to amend para 45 so as to read as follows :

"Every employee shall retire on attaining the age of 58 which shall be fixed as the age of superannuation."

If this amendment became effective, the position would be that employees who had put in 30 years of continuous unbroken service, but who had not att