Adverse inference from non-production of employment records confirms employee status; illegal termination without procedure warrants compensation.

COMMON ORDER

Since the issue involved in all these Writ petitions are similar in nature, they are disposed of by way of this common order.

2. For brevity, the petitioner in all these Writ Petitions are hereinafter referred to as the 'management' and the respondent in all these Writ petitions are hereinafter referred to as the 'workmen'. The respondent/workman in W.P.No.24889 of 2018 passed away and his legal heirs are brought on record as Respondents 2 to 4 in the said writ petition.

3. These Writ petitions have been filed seeking quashment of the impugned awards all dated 29.06.2018 made in I.D.Nos.72, 71, 70, 68 & 69 of 2009 respectively on the file of the III Additional Labour Court, Chennai.

4. The short facts necessary for disposal of these Writ petitions are as follows:-

It is the case of the workmen that they joined the services of the management as Drivers on a monthly salary of Rs.800/-, however, they have not been paid with the minimum wages, overtime wages and other welfare benefits and when the same was questioned by them, the management illegally terminated their services, against which the workmen herein raised industrial disputes in I.D.Nos.72, 71, 70, 68 & 69 of 2009 respectively and the III Additional Labour Court, Chennai, vide impugned awards all dated 29.06.2018 ordered for compensation to the tune of Rs.1,20,000/-, Rs.1,50,000/-, Rs.1,50,000/-, Rs.1,00,000/- and Rs.1,70,000/- respectively in favour of the respective workmen. Challenging the same, the management has come up with these Writ petitions.

5. Learned counsel appearing for the management submitted that there is no employer-employee relationship between the management and the workmen herein. The workmen herein are not permanent employees and though their names are found in the Drivers list maintained by the management, they have been engaged temporarily whenever necessity arises on contractual basis and after completion of their assignment, they will be paid 10% of the freight charges. While so, alleging that they were in continuous employment of the management as drivers, the workmen raised the present disputes and the Labour Court, without considering the fact that the workmen have miserably failed to establish the fact that they were permanent employees of the management, ordered for compensation in favour of the respective workmen, which is wholly unsustainable.

Accordingly, he prayed for appropriate orders.

6. Per contra, the learned counsel appearing on behalf of the workmen submitted that there is no evidence adduced by the Management before the Labour Court, denying the employment and the documents relating to engagement of Labourers/employees, which are in the custody of the Management were not produced before the Labour Court to substantiate that the workmen were not the employees of the Management and therefore, the Labour Court considered the evidence of the workmen and drawn adverse inference against the Management for non-production of oral and documentary evidence and came to the conclusion that the workmen herein are the employees of the Management and ultimately held that the termination of their services is illegal and ordered compensation in lieu of reinstatement, which cannot be said to be erroneous. Accordingly, he prayed for dismissal of these Writ petitions.

7. Heard the learned counsel for the parties and perused the materials available on record.

8. A perusal of the impugned order passed by the Labour Court reveals that no documentary evidence was marked either on the side of the Workmen or the M