1The petitioners were casual labourers with temporary status attached to the respondent Railway. The impugned notice (Ext. P1) was served on them in terms of S.25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 ('the Act'). This notice is challanged for the reason that it did not comply with S.25-F of the Act, in so far as it purported to terminate the services of the petitioners while their juniors were retained in service. This, the petitioners contend, was contrary to the rule that a junior should not ordinarily be retained in service while his senior is retrenched. This principle of last come, first go must ordinarily be followed except where it is deviated from for reasons to be recorded. This is what S.25-F says:
"25-G. Procedure for retirement.- Where any workman in an industrial establishment, who is a citizen of India, is to be retrenched and he belongs to a particular category of workmen in that establishment, in the absence of any agreement between the employer and the workman in this behalf, the employer shall ordinarily retrench the workman who was the last person to be employed in that category, unless for reasons to be recorded, the employer retrenches any other workman":
The

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