CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH (205) CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) Date of Decision: 23.07.2026 Hare Ram .....Petitioner Versus The State of Haryana and others .....Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MS. JUSTICE KIRTI SINGH Present: Mr. Sarvesh Rattan, Advocate (Legal Aid Counsel) for the petitioner. Mr. Kapil Bansal, DAG, Haryana. None for respondent No. 3. Mr. Harsh Aggarwal, Advocate respondent No. 4. **** KIRTI SINGH , J. (ORAL) 1. This petition under Articles 226/227 of the Constitution of India has been filed by the petitioner seeking quashing of the order dated 29.08.2000 (Annexure P-5), passed by the appropriate Government declining to refer the industrial dispute raised by the petitioner for adjudication to the Labour Court under Section 10(1) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 (for short, "the Act of 1947"), and further seeking quashing of the order dated 19.01.2001 (Annexure P-7), whereby the representation/legal notice dated 03.10.2000 (Annexure P-6) submitted by the petitioner against the said refusal was also declined. 2. Briefly stated, the petitioner was engaged as a "Mali" with respondent No.3 M/s The Printer House Limited with effect from 12.10.1990, without any formal appointment letter being issued to him. It is GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -2- the petitioner's case that his services were terminated with effect from 28.02.1998 without any notice, charge-sheet, or payment of retrenchment compensation. Alleging that this amounted to illegal termination in violation of the mandatory provisions of the Act of 1947, the petitioner raised an industrial dispute by serving a demand notice dated 26.07.1999 under Section 2-A of the Act (Annexure P-1) upon respondent No.3 as well as respondent No.4-M/s Prompt Security Services (Regd.), through whom the petitioner claimed to have been placed with respondent No.3. In response, respondent No.3 filed written comments dated 02.08.1999 (Annexure P-2) before the Conciliation Officer, categorically denying the existence of any relationship of employer and employee with the petitioner and asserting that the demand notice was not maintainable against it. Respondent No.4, on the other hand, filed separate written comments dated 20.09.1999 (Annexure P-3), admitting that the petitioner had been engaged through it with respondent No.3, but specifically pleading that the petitioner had, of his own volition and without intimation, sanction, or permission, absented himself from duty with effect from 07.02.1998 and continued to remain absent, and that his services had at no point been terminated. The petitioner filed a rejoinder dated 27.09.1999 (Annexure P-4) traversing the stands taken by both respondents and reasserting his claim. 3. Upon conclusion of the conciliation proceedings, the appropriate Government, vide order dated 29.08.2000 (Annexure P- 5), declined to make a reference under Section 10(1) of the Act, recording that the petitioner was, on facts, not found to have worked with respondent No.3 but with respondent No.4, and that he had absented himself from duty with effect from 07.02.1998, his services never having been terminated. The petitioner thereafter addressed a GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -3- legal notice dated 03.10.2000 (Annexure P-6) calling upon the appropriate Government to reconsider its decision and make the reference; this too was declined vide order dated 19.01.2001 (Annexure P-7), the appropriate Government recording that the representation had been examined and did not disclose any ground warranting a change in its earlier decision. 4. Learned counsel for the petitioner has urged that the power exercised by the appropriate Government under Section 10(1) of the Act is administrative in character and not judicial or quasi- judicial, and that it was, therefore, not open to the appropriate Government to adjudicate upon disputed questions of fact-namely, the identity of the petitioner's real employer and whether his services stood terminated-while declining the reference. It is submitted that such questions, being triable issues going to the very existence of the industrial dispute, could only have been authoritatively determined by the Labour Court upon a reference being made, and that the impugned orders, having usurped that adjudicatory function, are illegal, arbitrary and without jurisdiction. 5. Learned State counsel, appearing along with learned counsel for respondent No.4, has opposed the petition, submitting that the impugned order was passed after due consideration of the report of the Conciliation Officer as well as the written comments filed by respondent Nos.3 and 4, and that no error, much less a jurisdictional one, can be said to vitiate the same. It is pointed out that respondent No.4, while admitting engagement of the petitioner, had specifically pleaded voluntary and continuing absence without any order of termination ever having been passed, and that the appropriate GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -4- Government, in these circumstances, was justified in declining the reference. 6. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the record. 7. The scope and limits of the power exercised by the appropriate Government under Section 10(1) of the Act, while making or declining to make a reference, stand authoritatively settled. In Bombay Union of Journalists v. State of Bombay, AIR 1964 SC 1617, Hon'ble the Supreme Court held that a prima facie examination of the merits cannot be said to be foreign to the enquiry which the appropriate Government is entitled to make while dealing with a dispute under Section 10(1), and that the appropriate Government does not exceed its jurisdiction merely by forming a prima facie view, on the material before it, regarding the nature of the dispute sought to be referred. This position was reiterated by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Secretary, Indian Tea Association v. Ajit Kumar Barat, (2000) 3 SCC 93, where it was held that an order made by the appropriate Government under Section 10 is an administrative order and not a judicial or quasi-judicial one; that no lis is involved, the order being made on the subjective satisfaction of the Government; that a writ court cannot scrutinise such an order as closely as it would a judicial or quasi-judicial determination, to examine whether there was sufficient material to sustain the Government's conclusion; and that interference by way of mandamus would lie only where the Government is shown to have taken into account any irrelevant or extraneous consideration, or where it is shown that what stood declined was not, in truth, an industrial dispute within the meaning of GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -5- the Act. 8. Tested on this settled position, the impugned order dated 29.08.2000 does not disclose any jurisdictional infirmity. The appropriate Government did not purport to return a final or conclusive adjudication on the rival claims of the parties; it recorded a prima facie view, on the basis of the report of the Conciliation Officer and the written stands taken by respondent Nos.3 and 4 during conciliation, that respondent No.4-the very entity with whom the petitioner claimed to have been engaged-had itself admitted the factum of his engagement but had specifically and consistently pleaded that the petitioner had voluntarily absented himself from duty with effect from 07.02.1998 and that no order of termination had ever been passed against him. 9. Significantly, the petitioner did not, either before the Conciliation Officer or in these proceedings, place on record any document evidencing an actual order of termination, nor did he seriously controvert that he had stopped reporting for duty from 07.02.1998 onwards. Nothing on record suggests that the appropriate Government took into account any irrelevant or extraneous consideration, nor has the petitioner been able to show that the claim sought to be raised was, on a fair reading of the material, an industrial dispute within the meaning of the Act that was wrongly kept out of reference. In such a state of the record, it cannot be said that the appropriate Government transgressed the limits of its administrative jurisdiction, as explained in Bombay Union of Journalists and Ajit Kumar Barat (supra), merely by declining to refer a claim that, on the material before it, did not disclose even a prima facie case of GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh CWP No. 5478 of 2001 (O&M) -6- illegal termination. 10. The scope of judicial review available to this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution while examining an order declining reference under Section 10(1) of the Act is, correspondingly, a limited one, confined to cases of jurisdictional error, mala fides, consideration of irrelevant or extraneous material, or a decision that is otherwise perverse or unsupported by any material. The petitioner has had a full and fair opportunity of putting forth his case before the Conciliation Officer, his rejoinder dated 27.09.1999 stands duly considered, and the resultant orders dated 29.08.2000 and 19.01.2001 disclose due application of mind to the material on record. No jurisdictional infirmity, violation of the principles of natural justice, or patent illegality has been demonstrated by the petitioner that would warrant interference by this Court in the exercise of its extraordinary writ jurisdiction. 11. For the reasons recorded above, finding no merit in the present writ petition, the same is hereby dismissed. 12. Pending miscellaneous application(s), if any, shall also stand disposed of. (KIRTI SINGH) JUDGE July 23rd, 2026 Gurpreet Singh Whether speaking/reasoned : Yes/No Whether reportable : Yes/No GURPREET SINGH 2026.07.30 12:58 I attest to the accuracy and integrity of this document Chandigarh