Section 33C(2) requires pre-existing right or crystallized entitlement for maintainability; absent such right or direct employer-employee relationship in contract labour cases, Labour Court cannot adjudicate or allow claims.

(Judgment of the Court was delivered by S.M.Subramaniam J.)

The writ order dated 03.08.2023 passed in W.P. No. 25872 of 2018 is under challenge in the present writ appeal.

2. The appellants herein are the workmen claiming wages under Section 33C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (for brevity, hereinafter referred to as the ‘Act’). The appellants/workmen were engaged by the writ petitioner, who is the 1^st respondent / Management through the 2^nd respondent/ registered contractor as contract labourers under the Contract Labour (Abolition and Regulation) Act, 1970. They were working as Mazdoor and were not absorbed even though they entered service in the year 1978.

3. Admittedly, the 1^st respondent / management terminated the contract of the 2^nd respondent/ registered contractor through letter dated 04.11.1998, and in-turn the 2^nd respondent/ registered contractor terminated the services of the appellants/workmen through letter dated 14.11.1998. They were also paid closure compensation and other legal dues through cheque.

4. The appellants/workmen filed computation petitions under Section

33C(2) of the Act for differing periods between October, 1998 and February, 2013, claiming full wages for the said periods on account of violation of Section 25-O of the Act, wherein the workmen alleged the closure to be illegal as it was issued without obtaining prior permission from the Government. The 1^strespondent/management opposed the same stating there is no ‘Employer- Employee relationship’ between the management and workmen. The claim petitions were allowed by the Labour Court and directed the management to pay the claims made by the workmen. Thus, the 1^st respondent/management herein preferred the writ petitions. The Writ Court after elaborate consideration allowed the writ petitions and made a finding that since the workmen did not satisfy the conditions stipulated under Section 33C(2) of the Act with regard to the Employer-Employee relationship, application under Section 25-O of the Act does not arise.

5. Learned counsel for the appellants would mainly contend that the 1^st respondent/ management is hand in glove with the 2^nd respondent / registered contractor, acting to the detriment of the workmen to negate the claim of wages to which the workmen are otherwise entitled to. The workmen expressed grievance over the closure of undertaking to be violative of Section

25-O of the Act, and are thus eligible to make claim under Section 33C(2) of the Act.

6. Per contra, the learned counsel for the 1^st respondent/management would mainly contend that the scope of Section 33C(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act has been well defined in catena of judgment. Pre-existing right/entitlement is to be established to maintain the claim petition to recover the money due from an employer. In the absence of any pre-existing right, petition under Section33C(2) is not entertainable.

7. Let us consider the spirit of Section 33C(1)(2) of the Act, which reads as under, “33C. Recovery of money due from an employer.-

(1) Where any money is due to a workman from an employer under a settlement or an award or under the provisions of Chapter V-A or Chapter V-B, the workman himself or any other person authorised by him in writing in this behalf, or, in the case of the death of the workman,his assignee or heirs may, without prejudice to any other mode of recovery, make an application to the appropriate Government for the recovery of the money due to him,and if the appropriate Government is satisfied that any money is so due, it shall issue a certificate for that amount to the Collector who shall proceed to recover the same in the same manner as an arrear