Rajasthan High Court: Mohammad Rafiq, J. disposed of an application seeking a grant of last wages drawn by the employee under the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947.
In the present case, the respondent-employee had moved an application under Section 17-B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 for receiving the amount of wages last drawn by him from the date of filing the application.
The counsel representing the petitioner-employer, Neeraj Jain submitted that the labour court erred in passing the award since there was no master-servant relationship subsisting between the parties.
The Court upon hearing both the parties stated, that once the labour court has declared in its award that the retrenchment of respondent-employee as illegal, even if the execution of the award has been stayed, according to mandate of Section 17-B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 the respondent-employee is having statutory right to receive amount of wages last drawn by him from the date of filing of the application. However, the petitioner-employer will have an option to re-engage the respondent-employee as per the payable wages. The Court directed the petitioner-employer to pay the amount due to the petitioner within a period of six weeks.[Manager Employer v. Judge Industrial Dispute, 2019 SCC OnLine Raj 3027, decided on 19-09-2019]
