Voluntary abandonment of service and refusal to respond to show cause notice does not necessitate enquiry into the matter for ordering termination: Bombay High Court

The employees issued a strike out notice and refused to work for the petitioner. The petitioner challenged the notice before the Industrial Court and obtained an order of interim relief which treated strikeout notice as unfair practice and employees were directed to desist from the same. The employees, however, did not resume services. The petitioner then issued a show cause notice summoning the employees to show cause, failing which it shall be presumed that they have voluntarily relieved themselves from the services. The employees failed to respond to the show cause notice and accordingly the petitioner presumed that the employees have voluntarily relieved themselves and consequently their names were deleted from the muster. The employees argued that striking off their name from muster roll amounts to termination of service by way of retrenchment within the meaning of Section 2(oo) of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947. The Court observed that the act of deletion of name of the employees from muster roll cannot be said to be a positive act at the hands of the employer, but will be an act of a consequential nature. One cannot expect the employer to indefinitely wait for the employees to resume services. It was further noted that the principles of natural justice cannot be examined in vacuum without reference to the fact-situation arising in the case and in such circumstances of unauthorised absenteeism, enquiry may not be necessitated. In this regard two important principles can be relied upon, one is that a long-standing unauthorised absence would enable the employer to draw an inference that the workman has no intention to resume duty, unless the workman proves otherwise. The second is that once the long-standing unauthorised absence of the employee is established, failure to hold domestic enquiry would not prevent the employer from establishing misconduct before the Industrial Adjudicator.

Therefore, in the present case, the employees failed to resume services and also failed to submit any explanation. Thus, they abandoned the services and were, accordingly, relieved. There was no need to hold enquiry. Accordingly, the complaints filed by the respondents employees are dismissed in this 2025:BHC-NAG:5139.