2008 (5) TMI 714

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....g a reference for adjudication under the said provision. 2. Background facts in a nutshell are as follows: The appellant company was established in 1957 for the manufacture of high voltage electric cables and wires. The company has manufacturing units at Borivli and Nasik. In the present case we are concerned with the Company's unit at Borivli. The company made an application in terms of Section 25-N(2) to the Specified Authority on 16.1.2003 to retrench 280 workmen out of 509 workmen working at its Borivli Unit. The Specified Authority, after giving an opportunity of being heard to the company, workmen and other interested persons, including workers unions and after conducting an inquiry, by a reasoned order dated 29.4.2003 partly allowed....

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....ingle Judge relying upon the judgment of a Division Bench of Gujarat High Court in Rajya General Kamgar Mandal and Ors. v. Vice President, Packart Press Div. Ambalal Sarabhai Enterprises, Baroda and Ors. (1995 II CLR 613) further held that merely because review application is rejected, reference cannot be said to be barred under Section 25-N(6) of the Act and, accordingly, directed the specified authority to refer the matter for adjudication to the Industrial Tribunal in accordance with Section 25-N(6) of the Act. Stand of the appellant both before the learned Single Judge and the Division Bench was that once the review application is disposed of, there is no scope for further making a reference in view of the clear language of Section 25-N....

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....anting or refusing to grant permission under sub-section (3) or refer the matter or, as the case may be, cause it to be referred, to a Tribunal for adjudication. Provided that where a reference has been made to a Tribunal under this sub-section, it shall pass an award within a period of thirty days from the date of such reference." (Underlined for emphasis) 7. In Excel Wear v. Union of India and Ors. (1978 (4) SCC 224) this Court considered the legality of Section 25-O and 25-R as it stood then. It was held that those provisions were violative of Section 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India, 1950 (in short the 'Constitution'). It was held that steps under Section 25-N as it stood then cannot be read into Section 25- O. 8. In Workmen of M....

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....ternative. 12. The word 'or' is normally disjunctive and 'and' is normally conjunctive. But at times they are read as vice versa to give effect to the manifest intention of the Legislature as disclosed from the context. As stated by Scrutton, L.J.: "You do sometimes read 'or' as 'and' in a statute. But you do not do it unless you are obliged because 'or' does not generally mean 'and' and 'and' does not generally mean 'or'. And as pointed out by Lord Halsbury the reading of 'or' as 'and' is not to be resorted to, "unless some other part of the same statute or the clear intention of it required that to be done". But if the literal reading of the words produces an unintelligible or absurd result 'and' may be read for 'or' and 'or' for 'and' e....