DECISION ' Heard Mr. Shafat Hussain for the appellant.
' These are two connected Review Applications under Civil Procedure Code praying that the Labour Appellate Tribunal should review its own order and set aside the re-instatement order passed by the Labour Court in two cases.
2. The Labour Court had passed orders in cases of grievance petitions on merits: and allowed the petitions. At that time the petitioners were considered to be workers under the I.R.O. And Standing Orders Ordinance. By the time ,the appeal came up before the Tribunal and Ordinance had been passed changing the status of the petitioners to that of civil servants. It is also stated in the said Ordinance that all such cases pending at that time would abate as the Labour Court or Labour Appellate Tribunal would have no jurisdiction to deal with them. Order was, therefore, passed on appeals that these appeals abated. The learned Advocate for the appellant has filed this Review Application for setting aside the orders of re-instatement passed by the Labour Courts at the time that they had jurisdiction.
3. These Review Applications have been filed under section 151, C.P.C. Read with Order 47, Rule 1 and section 20 of the General Clauses Act it has been held in a number of cases by this Tribunal that the scope of section 36 of the I.R.O., 1969 is limited and under section 36(2) some powers under the Civil Procedure Code have been prescribed for the purpose of adjudicating and determining any Industrial Dispute. These powers are for forcing attendance of witnesses, compelling production of documents and issuing commissions. The Labour Court or the Tribunal has no authority to pass orders provided by the Civil Procedure Code in the labour cases as held in 1978 PLC 554.
4. Since the jurisdiction in respect of the cases pending before the Tribunal had ceased, this Tribunal cannot pass any further orders as the appeals stood abated under the statute.
5. These Review Applications are, therefore, misconceived. No order was passed and, therefore, no Review Order can be passed now.
6. These Review Applications are therefore dismissed in limine.