Industrial jurisprudence

INDUSTRIAL DISCIPLINE AND NATURAL JUSTICE: D.V.S.R. Prabhakara Rao; Law Publishing House, 39,
Sheo Charan Lal Road, Allahabad- 211003. Rs. 400.

THE WORLD is whirling forward holding the standard of advance as industrialisation. Industry, be it in
the public, private or joint sector, involves employer and employee, and progress postulates harmony
and justice in industrial relations. Whether the system is capitalist or socialist or other, if friction and
break-down afflict the smooth working of the industry, flames of strike and lock-out will spoil or stall
production and victimise society which is the ultimate beneficiary of satisfactory industrial discipline
and consequent flow of goods and services. These are basics but legal problems arise, where a clash
or brush breaks out, the management takes disciplinary action against workers or the workers go on
lightning strike and paralysis in the factory creates a crisis. The function of the law is to intervene
and, by a justice process, resolve the dispute. ``Hire and fire'' is not our jurisprudence. Even so,
lawlessness is anathema.

What then are the parameters of mutual discipline and procedural norms? Complex questions,
puzzlesome situations and involvement of conciliation, arbitration and other alternatives have to be
resorted to. The subject is critical, the battle is marked by obdurate tension and, when things hot up,
explosive aberrations mar reasonable settlements. Everything about the play of natural justice and
enquiry into workers' conduct has to be regulated by law. The author, with painstaking thoroughness,
has written the book under review fairly comprehensively covering industrial discipline and natural
justice. A welcome addition to the lengthy labour law literature, good for the practitioner in this
branch of law.

Not all can afford or need great legal classics, highly priced and prized, heavy and weighty,
demanding much time and scholarship from foremost leaders of the bar in industrial law like a G. B.
Pai. Labour Law in India by G. B. Pai is a marvel but costly and comprehensive. The ordinary rim of
lawyers and law teachers, students and consultants in labour jurisprudence really need a fairly
exhaustive, accurately covering all the fundamentals, leading cases and dealing with daily disputes
engaging managements and workers and other important problems which need expertise. To resolve
without long-drawn-out litigation common disputes is the desideratum. A solecism of initial blunder
may generate legal heat and forensic spiral from court to court. This book fills the bill and should be
a popular presence in every labour lawyer's library and management's constancy literature.

Disciplinary proceedings are frequent and the law is not as simple as one would expect, with the
Supreme Court and High Courts weaving nuances in the law. We are governed by the law but the law
is what the judges say it is. And when judicial pronouncements play dice with law, industrial justice
becomes a Las Vegas visit with gambling uncertainty.

By his discussion of case law, the author has stabilised the law and imparted clarity where obscurity
baffles. Indeed, in law as Holmes once indicated, it is more important to emphasize the obvious than
to investigate the obscure. In this respect, Rao has done well, especially where disciplinary enquiries
and natural justice seek reconciliation.

A book is more than a collection of essays. It has a progressive dimension, unfolding chapterwise
various facets of a large subject. Continuity, homogeneity and a developmental sequence
differentiate a book from an olio of articles. Viewed from this angle, the author has done a sensible
job. The very prolegomenon reads sensible. Appropriate and up-to- date case-law enriches the
usefulness of the text. The historical variations in Indian and English law regarding natural justice are
significant. We are ahead and that is welcome. He has dealt with the idea of natural justice
corruptively and contents-wise. He argues for the need for writing of reasons in disciplinary enquiries
to reduce chances of arbitrariness. Remedies by way of appeal and writ and other principles
integrated with natural justice have also found thoughtful mention and discussion. Domestic enquiry
is where managements often stumble or adopt a make-believe cult. Naturally, he has thoroughly
dealt with investigations, enquiries, requirement of personal hearing and other common infirmities,
which beset such proceedings.
What is misconduct for which a worker can be punished? What is the bearing of standing orders in
regulating the relationship between the two partners of an industry? Model standing orders and their
application in practice plus a variety of other related issues have been considered and answers
suggested. Charge sheets, interim suspensions, role of tribunals, permissible evidence beyond the
Evidence Act, proportionality of punishment are some of the matters of consequence which have
been lucidly examined. Industrial adjudication and judicial review are important matters in industrial
law. Rightly the book examines these questions without legalese and mystiques.

Industrial law is rapidly (though wrongly) under mutation. The sound system we have will soon be
surrendered when foreign corporations fall foul on them. MNCs are allergic to industrial justice.
Gargantuan institutions, hungry for huge profits, find human justice anathematic impediments.

The Indian rulers these days are often ruled by corporate power from abroad and sacrifice socio-
economic justice of the Indian working class to tempt the appetite of trans-national big business.
When our laws regulating labour and its rights are jettisoned, as part of the package inviting powerful
corporate, the people of India, judges, jurists and lawyers must resist the operation.

The book does not deal with the futuristic syndrome. Therefore, it is the task of Indian labour to
begin the struggle against operation industrial injustice. Labour law apart, we cannot concept
consent to the dollarophilic chaos in the Indian cosmos - a proposition which applies to ``Swaraj
jurisprudence'' as a whole.

V. R. KRISHNA IYER