1. AWARD The petitioner/complainant Said Shah (the son of Sher Muhammad Shah), who was formerly a driver in the employment of the Government Transport Service; which is under the administrative control of the Road Transport Corporation has instituted this complaint under section 38 of the West Pakistan Industrial Disputes Ordinance, 1968, on the date 28-7-1969 (before the promulgation of the current, Industrial Relations Ordinance, 1969) In his complaint' he has stated that he was first employed as a driver by the Government Transport Service, Peshawar on the date 22-I1-1966. He has also stated that later on an unspecified date, he was shown a. charge-sheet and called upon to submit a brief reply to it. He asked for a copy of that charge-sheet and also applied for permission to inspect the relevant record so that he could make out copies of an accident report and of the statements made to the Police by the eye-witnesses of the accident in which the bus driven by him had been involved so that he could submit his reply to the charge-sheet that had been issued to him. These requests of his were, however, not accepted nor was he, given a opportunity of making a detailed reply to the charge-sheet. In these circumstances he wrote out a brief reply on the charge-sheet itself, which was taken back from him. According to the petitioner/complainant no departmental enquiry was subsequently held into the charges levelled against him. Nevertheless on the date 8-6-1968 the Regional Manager, G. T. S., Peshawar, terminated the services of the petitioner. The petitioner/ complainant then filed an appeal against the order regarding the termination of his services, which was rejected by the Director (Northern Zone), Rawalpindi; and information regarding its rejection was sent to the petitioner/complainant on the date 14-6-1969, which reached him after considerable delay. Before the Director heard the petitioner/complainant's appeal the complainant had addressed an application dated 19-5-1969 to the Regional Manager, G. T. S., Peshawar, in which he had asked for attested copies of the accident report and of the enquiry report or, alternatively; for permission to inspect the relevant record. The officers concerned wrote notes on the petitioner/ complainant's application to the effect that he should .be furnished with the copies that he hag applied for. Nevertheless the clerk concerned returned the petitioner/complainant's application to him, hence the petitioner was deprived of the opportunity of explaining his point of view to the Director and was also precluded front instituting another appeal. The petitioner/ complainant has submitted that according to the terms and conditions of his service it was essential on the, part of the respondent to have provided the petitioner/complainant with a copy of the accident report and with copies of the recorded statement relating to the preliminary enquiry along with the charge-sheet that was issued to him, and it was also obligatory for the respondent to have given him a period of seven days for tendering his reply to the charge-sheet. Denial of all these facilities amounted to variation of the petitioner/complainant's terms and conditions of service. It was also necessary to 'have issued a show-cause notice to the petitioner accompanied by a copy of the enquiry officer's report, nevertheless, even these steps were not taken in this case. The complainant has mentioned that Industrial Dispute No. 12/68 was p6nding in this Court at the time when the services of the petitioner were terminated and he himself was directly concerned with that dispute. He has sought to emphasize the fact that his deprivation by the respondent of the above-mentioned facilities due to him during the pendency of this industrial dispute was tantamount to alteration of the terms and conditions of his service and his eventual dismissal from service was also unlawful and void. In the light of all these contentions the petitioner/complainant has prayed that this Court might order the respondent, i.e., Road Transport Corporation, to restore the terms and conditions of service of the petitioner and to re-instate him in - service with full benefits.
2. A briefly worded reply to the above-summarized complaint was filed on behalf of the respondent. It was mentioned-in the reply that the petitioner/complainant was issued a proper charge-sheet Said and he was given an opportunity to defend him and was also heard in person. The respondent contested the statement of the petitioner/complainant that the latter was concerned with any industrial dispute pending in this Court and also stressed the fact that the charge of misconduct on the basis of which his May employment had been terminated is not connected with any such Ah., industrial dispute. The respondent therefore prayed for the so dismissal of the complaint under consideration. According to the request of the petitioner/complainant and his representative the petitioner's own statement was recorded by this Court as his own evidence, and the, evidence of the petitioner was then closed by his representative. There after statements of these witnesses of the respondent were recorded by this Court. Those three witnesses were Mr. Naseer-ul-Hassan; a representative of the respondent, Mr. Amir Hussain Mughal; another representative of the respondent and Khawaja Muhammad, Assistant Traffc Manager, G. T. S., Peshawar. The third witness was the officer who had been appointed by the respondent to conduct a departmental enquiry into the charges against the petitioner/ complainant.
3. I shall now consider the merits of the petitioner/complainant's case as presented by him in the complaint under, consideration. It would be relevant to this context to reproduce the contents of the deposition of the petitioner/complainant Said Shah, during his examination-in-chief in the capacity of his own witness. The petitioner made the following statement in this Court:-- "I was employed as a bus driver by the Government Transport Service, Peshawar on 22-11-1966. I was dismissed from service by the respondent on 8-8-68. No charge-sheet was communicated to me by the respondent before dismissing me nor was I shown any written charge-sheet by any body on behalf of the respondent before the order about my dismissal was passed. An enquiry was however held against me by Khawaja Muhammad who was probably a Chief Inspector of the Government Transport Service, Peshawar. The enquiry was held in my presence. During that enquiry the statements of six witnesses were recorded by the enquiry officer. All those statements were in my favour. The sixth witness was summoned by the enquiry officer and his second statement was recorded and this second statement of the sixth witness was against me and was therefore, inconsistent with the first statement of the same witness. I suspect that the second statement was made by that six witness against meander pressure. The sixth witness whose name I do not know was the tin-smith.
4. The names of two witnesses were Fazal-ur-Rehman and Qazi Daulat Ali. During that oral enquiry I learnt that it was being held in connection with it bus accident that had taken place while I had been driving that bus near Lawrencepur. During that accident my bus had turned turtle because the gaget known as the tie-rod had been broken loose and dropped somewhere. I produced two witnesses in my defence during that oral enquiry. After my dismissal I submitted an application dated 19-5-1969 to the Regional Manager, G. T. S., Peshawar, which was returned to me. That original application I. hereby tender in evidence as Exh. P.
1. In this application I .had asked for copies of the accident report and the enquiry officer's report for further action but these reports were not supplied to me in response to this application even after my dismissal although a note was recorded in English on this application that those copies might be issued to me if admissible under the rules. Even before my dismissal I was not given any show-cause notice and I did not receive a copy of the enquiry officers report before I was removed from service. I hereby tender in evidence as Exh. P. 2 the original order passed by the G. T. S---, Peshawar in regard to my dismissal.
5. I filed an appeal against my dismissal to the Director (N Z) of the Road Transport Corporation, Rawalpindi. That appeal was rejected and I have now filed the application under consideration in the present Court. Industrial Dispute No. 12 of 1968 was pending and is still pending in this Court between some workmen of the Road Transport Corporation and the respondent. Road Transport.
6. Corporation and I am concerned with the subject-matter of that dispute. I do not know English; but I can read Urdu. The statements of witnesses recorded during the enquiry were not explained to me."
7. (Quotation concluded).
8. It is essential to mention here that although in paragraph 3 of his complaint the petitioner/complainant has stated that no departmental enquiry had been held into the charges against him and also complained that he had not been afforded any opportunity of defending himself yet in his above-cited statement as a witness in this Court he clearly admitted that an enquiry 'had been' held into the charges against, him by Khawaja Muhammad (the respondent's witness No. 3), who was an officer of the G. T. S.,. Peshawar, and that this enquiry had been held in the presence of the complainant/petitioner and the statement's of six witnesses were recorded by that enquiry officer'. The petitioner/complainant's case is, therefore, characterized by a glaring inconsistency.
9. I have heard the representatives of both parties and have examined the entire relevant record minutely. It is essential to emphasize the fact that this complaint has been instituted under section 38 of the "West Pakistan Industrial Disputes Ordinance, 1968", the, provisions of which are worded as follows:-
38. Where an employer contravenes the provisions of section 37 during the pendency of proceedings before a Court, any workman aggrieved by such contravention may make a complaint in writing in the prescribed manner to such Court and on receipt of such complaint, that Court shall adjudicate upon the complaint as if it were an industrial dispute in respect of which application has been made under subsection (8) of Said Shesection 6. "
10. It is abundantly clear from the above-cited provisions of section 38 of that Ordinance that a. complaint can be addressed in writing to-this Court by an aggrieved workman only against the alleged contravention by his employer of the provisions of alleged contravention section 37 of the West Pakistan Industrial Disputes Ordinance, Chairman 1968' during the pendency of some proceedings before this Industrial Court. The petitioner/complainant and his represen--tative have failed to convince me that any proceedings to which the present complaint might be considered to be relevant were pending in this Industrial Court at the time when the respondent took disciplinary action against the complainant Said Shah. They have also found themselves at a loss to substantiate the contention of the petitioner/complainant that he was directly interested in Industrial Dispute No. 12/68 which was pending in this Court at the time when he was dismissed by the respondent from service. Conversely, no concrete evidence or cogent arguments have been brought forward by the petitioner/ complainant to establish the fact that any conciliation proceedings relating to the controversy that arose between the petitioner/complainant and the Government Transport Service, Peshawar (in consequence of a bus accident attributed to the petitioner/complainant's negligence) were ever conducted at all. As a matter of fact there is not an iota of evidence on the record to support the, petitioner's contention that the conditions of service applicable to him immediately before the commencement of any conciliation proceedings were altered to his prejudice by the respondent. Lastly, it is common ground between the two contending parties that the petitioner/complainant was dismissed from service under' the authority of the respondent on a charge of misconduct based upon the allegation that the petitioner/complainant when serving as a driver had caused an accident to the respondent's bus driven through negligence. This being the true position of the matter it is scarcely necessary to elaborate the point that the misconduct attributed by the respondent to the petitioner/complainant was not connected with any industrial dispute pending in this Industrial Court at the time when the petitioner's dismissal took place. In view of the nature of the duties of the petitioner/complaint when he was serving as a driver in the employment of the respondent, the respondent was fully competent to determine the question of the fitness or otherwise of the petitioner/complainant for retention in the respondent's employment after a bus accident bad taken place for which the petitioner/complainant cannot completely divest himself of responsibility inasmuch as the bus in question was being driven by him when it capsized on a public highway.
11. The petitioner/complainant has failed to prove that he was subjected to any wilful injustice by the respondent in the present case. All the above recorded facts lead inevitably to the conclusion that in the case the respondent's employer decidedly did not contravene any provisions of the 'West Pakistan Industrial Relations Ordinance, 1968' in dismissing the petitioner/complaint Said Shah from service on a charge of misconduct not connected with any, pending industrial dispute. The petitioner/complainant has not claimed to be an officer of a registered Trade Union hence the prior permission of this' Industrial Court for dismissing him from service was not required by the respondent.
12. Given the above-stated facts and circumstances I have no option but to dismiss the complaint of the petitioner/complainant Said Shah against his dismissal from service by the respondent.