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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2001 Parliament attack anniversary: Vice Prez, PM Modi, MPs pay tributes to fallen heroes
New Delhi (PTI): Vice President C P Radhakrishnan on Saturday led Parliamentarians in paying floral tributes to those who died fending off terrorists who attacked the Parliament House in 2001.
On the 24th anniversary of the attack, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Radhakrishnan, who is also the Rajya Sabha Chair, were among the first to offer tributes.
A brief function is held outside the now old Parliament building (Samvidhan Sadan) every December 13 to mark the day.
CISF personnel presented a salute or "samman guard" at the venue, after which a moment of silence was observed to mark the anniversary. Till 2023, the CRPF used to offer 'salami shastra' (present arms).
Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, a senior party leader, were also present at the event. Union ministers Kiren Rijiju, Jitendra Singh and Arjun Ram Meghwal also lined up to offer flower petals at the photographs of the personnel who went down foiling the attack.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla is in Latur to attend the funeral of former speaker of the Lower House of Parliament and ex-Union minister Shivraj Patil.
The attack was carried out by five armed terrorists, but personnel from the now former Parliament Security Service, CRPF and Delhi Police foiled the attack, with no terrorist being able to enter the building.
Six Delhi Police personnel, two Parliament Security Service personnel, a gardener and a TV video journalist were killed in the attack. All five terrorists were gunned down in the forecourt of the then Parliament building.
