ORDER

The prayer sought for herein is for a writ of certiorari calling for the records pertaining to the order passed in A.P.No.432 of 2011 dated 28.02.2018 on the file of the Special Deputy Commissioner of Labour, Teynampet, Chennai – 600 006 and quash the same.

2. The respondent was working as a Conductor at the petitioner Corporation against whom a disciplinary proceedings was initiated for the alleged charge of unauthorised absence for 8 days and more.

3. Pursuant to which, a charge memo was prepared and based on which, a domestic enquiry was conduced since the respondent did not appear for the domestic enquiry, it was conducted exparte and during the relevant point of time since there was an industrial dispute pending before the concerned authority, it become necessitated for the petitioner management to seek an approval for such decision taken to terminate the petitioner pursuant to the said domestic enquiry conducted in this regard under Section 33(2)(b) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.

4. Such an application to seek approval from the Labour Commissioner was sent by the petitioner management and the said application having been considered was rejected by the Labour Commissioner by the order impugned dated 28.02.2018 in A.P.No.432 of 2011. Challenging the same, the petitioner management has filed the present writ petition.

5. Heard Mr.M.Chidambaram, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner who would submit that, though notice had been sent to the respondent employee, it could not be served, therefore it was pasted in the Notice Board and subsequently, as the respondent employee did not cooperate or turn for conducting the enquiry, the management decided to proceed with an exparte enquiry and accordingly an exparte domestic enquiry was conducted and ultimately the Enquiry Officer, having considered the evidences available with him filed on behalf of the petitioner management, has come to the conclusion that, the charge made against the respondent i.e. unauthorised absence has been proved, based on which, the petitioner management has taken a decision to terminate the respondent from service by taking into account the Enquiry Officer's report as well as the earlier punishment awarded by the petitioner management to the respondent, where, 12 time such kind of punishment has been awarded to the respondent employee.

6. When that application was made to the Labour Commissioner, he has not considered the said application in proper perspective and has only proceeded to decide all the questions based on the Hon'ble Supreme Court judgment in Lalla Ram Vs. DCM Chemical Works AIR 1978 (SC) 1004 and come to a cryptic conclusion that, before the Labour Commissioner, except the Enquiry Officer's report nothing since has been filed by the petitioner management, such a question as to whether the domestic enquiry was properly conducted and the appropriate opportunity was given to the employee during the domestic enquiry and the evidences in support of the charge whether has been properly filed and that has been appreciated by the domestic Enquiry Officer could not be decided and also the application for approval since has been submitted with 11 days delay that was also taken as one of the ground and for all these reasons, the Labour Commissioner has come to the conclusion that, the domestic enquiry as well as the subsequent disciplinary action made against the respondent employee was not in consonance with the established procedure and accordingly, the Labour Commissioner rejected the approval application of the petitioner through the impugned order.

7. In this context, the learned counsel would canvass the point that, since the respondent employee has not cooperated for domestic enquiry, there had been no other option except to go for an exparte domestic enquiry on the part of the petitioner management and therefore, that cannot be found fault with against the respondent.

8. Moreover, the Enquiry Officer's report though had been filed b