July 26, 2002	Friday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 15,1423

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)

LAHORE, July 25: The 25 per cent ‘outsiders’ a trade union is allowed to have on its executive by the Industrial Relations Ordinance must also be ‘workmen’, the Lahore High Court held on Thursday.

A Sialkot concern had challenged the registration of its workers union for having ‘supervisory staff’ as its members and office-bearers and a non-workman ‘outsider’ as its secretary.

Justice Jawad S. Khwaja, who heard the petition, directed that an inquiry be held by the Sialkot registrar of trade unions whether there were ‘supervisors’ among the union members and office-bearers before proceeding further. As for ‘outsiders’, he declared that there was no bar on them so long as their number did not exceed 25 per cent.

While the inquiry was in progress, the concern moved an intra-court appeal to assert that the judge erred in holding that any ‘outsider’ could hold an office in a trade union.

Appearing on its behalf, Advocate M.A. Ghani Chaudhry argued that the outsiders must be ‘workman’ actually employed in any factory other than the one to which the trade union belonged. He said the object of the relevant IRA provision allowing ‘outsiders’ was not to enable the workers or their union to benefit from the expertise of experienced trade unionists or legal experts but to keep the supervisory and managerial staff away from the employees’ associations. The trade unions are meant exclusively for ‘workmen’, 25 per cent of whom may belong to other concerns or factories.

The appellate division bench upheld the argument and passed an interim order granting the relief in the pending appeal.