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Court stalls bonus for
Bombay civic staff: PTI

The resolution was quashed by Justices B N Srikrishna and Ranjana Desai, who heard a petition challenging disbursement of the ex gratia to the civic employees and questioning the legality of the resolution passed by the civic body's general body on October 13 authorising such a payment.

The judges held that the resolution was against the provisions of the BMC Act as it was not referred to the municipal commissioner for his remarks before moving it in the general body.

However, the court gave liberty to the civic body to move a fresh resolution concerning payment of ex gratia and follow the procedure laid down in the BMC Act.

As regards action on the workers who had resorted to a flash strike on October 10 and 11, resulting in a severe water crisis, the judges left the issue to the discretion of the civic body and the state government.

The court also expressed displeasure over the state government's apathy in avoiding to invoke its powers under Section 520 (b) of BMC Act to prevent ex gratia payments when the civic body was facing a financial crunch.

The judges held that the state government should have taken suo motu action by striking down the civic resolution instead of waiting for the municipal commissioner's report.

The judges expressed surprise over the government's reply that the state was unaware about the situation in the city due to the strike resorted to by civic workers.

They also rejected the plea of trade unions to grant a six-week stay on the verdict. The judges turned down their request made by their counsel J P Cama to refer back the resolution to the civic body for reconsideration.

The petition, filed by former municipal commissioner D M Sukhthankar, questioned the wisdom of the civic body in paying ex gratia to its employees in violation of BMC Act.

His counsel R D Soni and Mohan Jaykar argued that 65 per cent of the civic body's revenue was spent on wages and allowances to the staff while only 35 per cent remained to be utilised on providing amenities. The civic body also had to wipe out deficits of previous years.

In such cases, they argued, the state should have invoked powers under Section 520 (b) of BMC Act to interfere in the affairs of the civic body and stop such payments; but it had chosen to remain a silent spectator.

The government filed an affidavit saying that it was awaiting the report of municipal commissioner. In the absence of his report, the state could not have acted on its own, the court was told.

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