The Bombay Excessive Court docket on Friday rejected an attraction by the Indian Institute of Expertise-Bombay towards the orders of the Assistant Labour Commissioner (Central), which acted as Controlling Authority that directed the institute to pay gratuity to 3 contract staff underneath the Cost of Gratuity Act.
Raman Sukar Garase, one of many three staff who had been granted aid by the authority, allegedly died by suicide in Could this 12 months, because of his lengthy drawn authorized battle for gratuity for contract staff, which he had been preventing for since his retirement in 2018 after 39 years of contractual service as a gardener.
It was alleged that he died by suicide because of non-availability of funds to handle medical bills.
A single-judge bench of Justice Sandeep V Marne on October 4 handed a verdict on plea by IIT-Bombay towards the authority’s choice of January, 2022, in favour of Tanaji Babaji Lad, Dadarao Tanaji Ingle and Garase.
The orders handed by the Controlling Authority had been upheld by the Appellate Authority and Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner (Central), although orders dated April 3, 2024 and similar had been additionally challenged by the institute.
The Controlling Authority, after contemplating rival contentions, held that the institute was liable to pay gratuity to the three and had directed the IIT-Bombay to pay Rs 1.89 lakh to Lad, Rs 2.35 lakh to Ingale and Rs 4.28 lakh to Garase, together with 10 per cent annual curiosity on the quantities accrued from their retirement dates.
Advocate Arsh Mishra for IIT-Bombay argued that the authorities failed to think about that there was no employer-employee relationship between the institute and the three contractual staff as they had been staff of the contractor, who alone was chargeable for cost of gratuity. The institute didn’t management or supervise them, Mishra argued. He added that the authorities erred in holding that the director of IIT-Bombay had final management over affairs of firm.
Senior advocate Gayatri Singh and advocate Sudha Bharadwaj for the respondent staff argued that they’d been working with the institute for a substantial time frame by a number of contractors since 1999. Singh argued that whereas Lad and Ingale had already withdrawn the principal quantity of gratuity from the Appellate authority,
Garase’s widow was in dire want of funds and he or she needs to be allowed to withdraw the dues.
Justice Marne famous that if respondent staff had been made to “run behind a number of contractors from safety gratuity from every of them, the identical wouldn’t solely end in multiplicity of proceedings however would additionally frustrate the very function of making swift and speedy treatment earlier than the Controlling Authority for cost of gratuity”.
The choose famous that it was troublesome to carry that IIT-Bombay had completely no management over them through the years and it clearly gave the impression to be “an association of merely routing of salaries by contractors”.
The bench added that as per work order issued to final contractor M/s Moosa Companies Firm, there was no particular situation for cost of gratuity to the contractor, regardless of there being mandate for contractor to Provident Fund and ESIC contribution.
Discovering no error in orders handed by Authorities, the bench permitted authorized heirs of Garase to withdraw your entire quantity of gratuity deposited earlier than the appellate authority and directed the IIT-Bombay to pay quantity of curiosity awarded by the authorities to respondents or their authorized heirs inside two months.
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