1984 PLP 1550 (PLC(CS))

As the law point involved in all the three appeals is the same, they are being disposed. of together through this single judgment.

2. The facts are that the appellants were promoted to the post of lower Division Clerk (Workshops) Accounts Centre, with effect from 27th December, 1972. The grievance of the appellants is that the respondents have not taken into account for the purposes of the grant of increments to them, the period from 27th December, 1972 to 31st July, 1973. They, therefore, after serving grievance notices, brought grievance petitions under section 25-A of the Industrial Relations Ordinance. An objection was raised before the lower Court that the appellants were civil servants, therefore, the jurisdiction of the Labour Court was barred. The learned lower Court answered the point in favour of the respondent and returned the grievance petitions to the appellants.

3. Admittedly, the appellants are Government servants, because the Railway is a department of the Government and is running directly by the Government. Being Government servants the appellants fall within the definition of civil servants and the only question to be seen is whether they are excluded from the definition on account of the exceptions given in the definition of civil servant. The exceptions are that the employees who are covered by the definition of workman given in the Workmen's Compensation Act or the Factories Act, they are excluded from the definition of civil servants. The appellants being clerks cannot be said to have been employed in any factory or in any manufacturing process. The definition of workman given in the Factories Act goes as under :-- 'Worker' means a person employed directly or through an agency whether for wages or not, in any manufacturing process, or in clean ing any part of the machinery or premises used for a manufacturing process, or in any other kind of work whatsoever, incidental to or connected with the subject of the manufacturing process, but does not include any person solely employed in a clerical capacity in any room/place where no manufacturing process is being carried on." There is no material on the record that the appellants are employed on any work incidental to, or connected with the subject of manufacturing process. They are not serving within the precincts of any factory. They are, there fore, not performing their clerical duties in any room or place where any manufacturing process may be carried on. So far as the Workmen's Com pensation Act is concerned, clause (xii) of Schedule II states that the persons covered by clause (4) of section 3 and subsection (1) of section 1.48 of the Railways Act, would be workmen.

4. According to clause (4) of section 3 of the Railways Act, railway means a railway, or any portion of the railway for the public carriage of passengers, animals or goods. Clauses (a), (b) and (d) of subsection (4) do not require any interpretation. However, clause (c) needs a little bit of interpretation. It reads as under :- "all stations, offices, warehouses, wharves, workshops, manufactories, fixed plant and machinery and other works constructed for the pur poses of, or in connection with, a railway." The offices mentioned in clause (c) are the offices situated at railway stations, such as booking offices and parcel houses and not the offices having no connection with the railway station. Section 148 is all embracing. According to this section, the word `railway' occurring in sections 3(5), (6) and (7), 4 to 19, 47 to 52, 59, 79, 83 to 92, 96, 97, 98, 100, 101, 103, 104, 107, 111, 122, 124 to 132, 134 to 138, 140, 141, 144, 145 and 147 had reference to a railway or portion of railway under construction and a railway or portion of a railway not used for the public carriage of passengers, animals or goods as well as to a railway falling within the definition of that word in section 3(4). According to section 148, a railway under construction is also to be considered as railway although due to being under construction, it is not used for public carriage of passengers, animals or goods. But it does not show that any clerical office having no connection with any railway station, or office situated at the railway station will be considered as railway. The result is that the ad initiative or clerical offices not situated at the railway stations may be said to be having connection with the railway but cannot be themselves termed as railway in order to find out whether the employees working there stand included or excluded from the definition of civil servant. The result, therefore, is that only those persons who are working in any workshop or factory of the railway or at the railway stations come within the definition of railway's employees and thus stand excluded from the definition of civil servant. Since the offices in which the appellants were employed do not fall within the definition of railway, they are civil servants and the Labour Court has no jurisdiction. The learned lower Court, therefore, rightly held that the appellants were civil servants. There is no force in the appeals which are dismissed. M. I. Appeals dismissed.