Air India Limited being a private entity is no longer amenable to writ jurisdiction: Delhi High Court

Delhi High Court: In a case wherein, the petitioners had filed a writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution to issue a direction to the respondents to regularize the services of the petitioners as permanent employees, Chandra Dhari Singh, J., opined that the writ petition was not maintainable against Air India Limited (‘AIL’), Respondent 2, due to its privatization and granted liberty to the petitioners to take recourse to the remedies available before the competent forum.

Background

In the instant case, Respondent 2 issued a notification dated 23-03-1999 for casual empanelment. Subsequently, applications were invited for appointment of Casual Labourers against future vacancies in the unskilled categories. Thereafter, the due process of appointment was conducted and the petitioners were appointed in the year 2000 and 2004 and were deployed in the various departments of Respondent 2.

Further, despite working as Casual Labourers at Respondent 2 organization since last 18 years, the petitioners were not awarded the status of permanent employees. Subsequently, the petitioners made several representations before Respondent 2 addressing their grievances.

In 2011, around 68 casual workers of a wholly owned subsidiary of Respondent 2, were regularised and thereafter, some of the Casual Labours who were initially appointed on compassionate ground were also regularised. Afterwards, e-mails dated 16-08-2017 and 20-08-2018 were sent by Respondent 2, which stated the terms of transfer of the petitioners to different contractors.

The present writ petition was filed on behalf of the petitioners being aggrieved by the decision conveyed vide the e-mails dated 16-08-2017 and 20-08-2018, whereby, the petitioners were transferred to a private contractor namely Air India Singapore Aviation Transport Services, and the request for regularization of petitioner’s services as permanent employees was also declined by Respondent 2.

Analysis, Law, and Decision

The issues for consideration before this Court were:

1. Whether a writ was maintainable under Article 226 against a private entity which was earlier a government owned entity?

The Court relied on Zee Telefilms Ltd. v. Union of India, (2005) 4 SCC 649, and All India IDBI Officers Association v. Union of India, 2022 SCC OnLine Bom 2693, and opined that the Government entity which had been privatized did not fall within the ambit of Article 12 of the Constitution. The guiding factor was the nature of duty imposed on such a body namely, the public duty to make any authority amenable to the writ jurisdiction.

Therefore, the Court opined that under Article 226 of the Constitution, a writ could not be issued against a government entity which had been subsequently privatized and was not performing a public duty anymore.

2. Whether a writ could be maintained against AIL considering it was a private body but at the time of institution of the writ, it was an Authority under Article 12?

The Court referred to R.S Madireddy v. Union of India, 2022 SCC OnLine Bom 2657 and opined that the legal rights of the parties became fixed on the date when the litigation began, and the determination of the right to seek redress should be based on the date when the petitioner initiated legal proceedings. The Court further opined that the petitioner, despite having a legal entitlement to relief, might still be refused equitable relief due to subsequent or intervening circumstances.

The Court relied on Capt. Dhirendra Kumar v. Air India Limited, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 3722; Pankaj Bhargava v. Air India Limited, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 2567; Poonam Dinesh Singh v. CMD AIR India, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 2583; Yash Anand v. Air India Limited, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 1923, and Rohita Jaidka v. Air India Limited, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 1765, and opined that once the AIL had been privatized and the entire share holdings were disinvested from the hands of the Government of India, the grievance of the AIL’s employees could not be redressed directly under the writ jurisdiction of this Court.

3. Whether the relief as sought by the petitioners could be granted pursuant to the subsequent developments causing change in law?

The Court referred to Hukum Chandra v. Nemi Chand Jain, (2019) 13 SCC 363 and Pasupuleti Venkateswarlu v. Motor and General Traders, (1975) 1 SCC 770 and opined that the right to relief should be decided by reference to the position of law or circumstances on the date on which the petitioner filed the petition. There might be cases where the relief to which the petitioner was entitled to might have been rendered redundant by the lapse of time or by change of law.

The Court opined that the writ petition was initially maintainable when they were filed, had since become non-maintainable due to the privatization of AIL. Therefore, the grievance of the petitioners could be redressed only before the competent forum which could deal with the concerned question, and not under Article 226 of the Constitution.

Accordingly, the Court disposed of the writ petition and granted liberty to the petitioners to take recourse to the remedies available before a competent forum. For this purpose, the Court stated that the time period for which the writ petition had been pending in this Court should be excluded for the purpose of computation of limitation.

[Naresh Kumar v. Union of India, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 4919, order dated 31-07-2023]

Advocates who appeared in this case:

For the Petitioners: Hari Prakash, Advocate;

For the Respondents: Anjana Gosain, Advocate.

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