Housekeeping workmen should be considered as employees: Karnataka HC
Bengaluru (PTI): The High Court of Karnataka has held that housekeeping jobs are perennial in nature and the workmen should be considered as employees.
It ordered the restoration of services of several housekeeping workmen of the state-owned Mysore Electrical Industries Limited (MEIL).
In the year 2000, Shankar Nursery and Associated Detective & Security Services which had a contract with the company to supply these workmen terminated their contract and withdrew 66 workmen from work.
The matter reached conciliation proceedings and then the Labour Court.
In 2001, the HC stayed the Labour Court order of restoring the services and sent the matter back to the lower court.
In 2011, the Labour Court once again ordered that the workmen be restored to service. This was challenged by the company in the High Court. The HC judgment by Justice Suraj Govindaraj came on February 23, 2023.
The company claimed that housekeeping staff involved in gardening, loading and unloading were contract labourers who did a few hours of work in a day.
The HC rejected this contention and said, "These job profiles being ones whose services are required on a day to day basis, as also for months on end. I am of the considered opinion that these jobs are perennial in nature and therefore would not be temporary as contended."
The Court dismissed the contention of the company that the housekeeping workmen were contract labourers and upheld the order of the Labour Tribunal.
Justice Suraj Govindaraj in his judgment said, "The Tribunal has come to a right conclusion that the alleged agreement between the employer and the contractor is a sham and camouflage and the workers have been engaged for a long period of time and the instrumentality of contract workers has been used only to deprive them of their just amounts."
Ordering the restoration of the services of the workmen, the HC in its judgment said, "The workmen belonging to respondent-Union shall be treated as employees of the petitioner. Petitioner shall regularise their services subject to availability of vacancies and in the event of there being no vacancies, as and when the vacancies arise, the petitioner shall give preference to the members of the respondent-Union, if they are found suitable by relaxing the condition as to maximum age, as also academic qualifications."
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Badlapur accused Akshay Shinde shot dead: Lawyer of minor girls calls it 'killing of justice'
Mumbai (PTI): The gunning down of Badlapur case accused Akshay Shinde on Monday was the "killing of justice", said Asim Sarode, lawyer for the two minor girls he allegedly sexually assaulted.
Shinde was killed near Mumbra Bypass around 6:15pm when he allegedly snatched the gun of a policeman while he was being ferried in a police vehicle as part of a probe into a case registered on the complaint of his former wife.
After he shot and injured an API, another personnel from the escort team fired at him, and he was declared dead by doctors at a nearby hospital.
"While representing the two minor girls, I noticed it was becoming uncomfortable for the local politics of the Thane district and even for the educational institution where Akshay Shinde was working. Shinde's death in such a manner is killing of justice," Sarode told a regional news channel.
"Now, the case of sexual assault of the two minor girls will get sidelined. The case of these two minor girls was becoming difficult for the educational institute, as it is affiliated with a certain political family. Such a practice would lower the confidence of people in police and the judiciary," he claimed.
Sarode said he will be filing a plea before the Bombay High Court demanding thorough inquiry into the firing incident.
"Shinde's case could have brought up certain aspects that would have been negative politically for the government. I wonder how Shinde could access the gun and how he could unlock it when his hands were tied. This is political murder and is absolutely wrong," he said.
