Dismissal of challenge to labor compensation award based on smallness of amount involved.

The respondent-employee was engaged as a Class IV employee at the hospital of Petitioner No. 2 purely on a temporary basis, being called for work only when regularly appointed Class IV employees were on leave or unavailable

Pursuant to a Government Resolution dated 16.05.2005 directing the discontinuation of such temporary engagements, her services were terminated on 20.10.2005

Aggrieved, she raised an industrial dispute culminating in Reference Case No. 45 of 2006 before the Labour Court, Jamnagar, which, by award dated 06.07.2020, allowed the reference and directed the petitioners to pay Rs. 70,000/- as compensation in lieu of reinstatement with full back wages

The State invoked this Court's jurisdiction under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, seeking quashing and stay of the said award

Though served, none appeared for the respondent

1. Whether the judgment and award dated 06.07.2020 passed by the Labour Court, Jamnagar in Reference Case No. 45 of 2006 warranted quashing or interference in the exercise of writ jurisdiction under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution

2. Whether, given the triviality of the monetary amount involved, the petition merited dismissal without adjudication on merits

The Court's jurisdiction was founded on Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India, 1950, empowering judicial review and superintendence over awards of subordinate adjudicatory bodies such as the Labour Court

The underlying dispute arose within the industrial adjudication framework, i.e., a reference before the Labour Court resulting in compensation in lieu of reinstatement with back wages

the decisive principle was the discretionary doctrine of declining merits-based interference on account of the "smallness of the amount" involved, coupled with the Court's express direction that the order, being so grounded, "shall not be considered as precedent"

The learned AGP confined her challenge to a single submission — that the Labour Court erred in awarding Rs. 70,000/- as compensation — with "no other submissions" advanced

Rather than interrogating the merits of that contention (e.g., the legality of termination pursuant to the Resolution dated 16.05.2005, or the adequacy of compensation in lieu of reinstatement), the Court anchored its decision purely in judicial economy: observing that "the amount involved in the present petition is only Rs.70,000/-", it held that "considering the smallness of the amount," the petition "is required to be dismissed" "without going into the merits of the matter"

To preclude any wider application of this disposition, the Court expressly clarified that the judgment was delivered solely in light of the smallness of the amount and denied it precedential value

The Labour Court's award dated 06.07.2020 in Reference Case No. 45 of 2006 was consequently left undisturbed. The Court expressly directed that the judgment "shall not be considered as precedent"

Finally, the petitioners were directed to deposit the awarded compensation of Rs. 70,000/- with the respondent-employee within six weeks from the date of the judgment