Termination without notice or compensation violates Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act; reinstatement is not feasible after a long duration, warranting lump-sum compensation.

JUDGMENT

Mr. Sanjay Vashisth, J. ( Oral)

Petitioner - Oriental Carbon and Chemical Ltd., Dharuhera (Rewari), has filed the present writ petition for quashing of award dated 13.10.1998 (Annexure P-6), passed by learned Industrial Tribunal-cum-Labour Court, Gurgaon (in short, 'learned Tribunal'), whereby, reference No.195/89, filed under Section 10(1)(C) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (for brevity, 'ID Act'), has been answered in favour of respondent No.2 - K.C. Sharma (workman).

Learned Tribunal has held the workman (respondent No.2) to be entitled for reinstatement with continuity of service and full back-wages.

2. Through demand notice and claim statement, workman pleaded that he joined the service as 'Fitter' with the Management on 01.05.1986, and his services were illegally terminated on 15.12.1987. He was drawing the salary of Rs. 1050/- per month at the time of termination, which has been done in violation of Section 25-F of the ID Act, as neither any notice, nor notice pay or retrenchment compensation amount has been given to the workman.

In the written statement filed by the Management, it is pleaded that the workman himself had submitted his resignation on 14.12.1987, which was accepted on the same date i.e. 14.12.1987, after paying him full and final payment.

3. In the replication, workman pleaded that his signatures were obtained by the Management under duress and immediately, thereafter, he had made complaints to the police and Labour Department, through registered post.

4. After framing the issues on 13.02.1990, evidences were led by the respective parties. Workman - KC Sharma appeared as WW-1 and altogether denied his resignation and stated that resignation letter Ex.M-1 was not written by him. He further stated that his signatures over the voucher (Ex.M-5) were forcibly obtained by the Management and that no experience certificate was given to him.

5. Management examined its witnesses Mr. R.K. Krishnan as MW-1, who produced the resignation letter, which was forwarded to the Personnel Manager of the Company. However, in his cross-examination, said witness of the Management stated that the resignation was not written in his presence by the workman and Ex.M-3 is the photocopy of letter dated 14.12.1987, regarding acceptance of resignation of the workman. Another witness of Management i.e. G.D. Sharma, who appeared as MW-3, for proving the fact that vide voucher (Ex.M-5) payment mentioned therein was made to the workman. In regard to the signatures over the resignation letter, Management examined witness Sh. Som Nath Aggarwal (Hand Writing Expert) as MW-3, who after making comparison of the signatures, was opined in favour of the Management by stating that all the disputed signatures were written by the writer K.C. Sharma.

On the other hand, workman also examined one handwriting expert namely; Naresh Kataria (WW-2), and as per his report (Ex.WW-2/11), he opined disputed signatures marked Q-1 to be forged one.

6. Since, it is settled law that the opinion of the handwriting expert is a weak evidence and can never be conclusive because it is, after all opinion evidence and same cannot be made the sole basis for deciding the real issue. Without getting influenced or impressed with the reports of the handwriting experts produced by both the sides, learned Tribunal has also done certain exercises by itself examining the admitted signatures and disputed signatures over the resignation letter.

7. Learned Tribunal found that Ex.M-4, Ex.M-5 & Ex.M-6, are the admitted signatures of the workman. Disputed signature on comparison does not seem to be same. Learned Tribunal also noticed that signatures of the workman were obtained on the basis of knife and revolver and on the comparison, learned Tribunal concluded that the admitted signatures does not correspond with the disputed signatures.

8. For answering the reference in favour of the workman, learned Tribunal examined the issue from another angle that if the workman had sub