Duty to update address lies with employee, rules SC

THe sublime margaret court has ruled that the responsibleness to stay fresh an employer informed of unity’s whereabouts lies squarely on the employee, cautioning that a worker cannot seek to invalidate disciplinary action by claiming notices were sent to an old address that he himself failed to update.A bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta said that the responsibility to intimate a change of residence squarely rests on the employee and an employee cannot later seek to derive a legal advantage from failing to discharge that obligation.“An employer can only be expected to communicate with an employee at the address the employee has provided. If the respondent-employee had changed his place of residence, the obligation to inform his employer of the change rested on him. He cannot be permitted to take advantage of his own omission in this regard,” held the court in a judgment released last week.The ruling came in a dispute between Noida-based Rifilis Engineering Pvt Ltd and its employee Arjun Gupta, who worked as a moulder with the company since 2006.According to the company, Gupta stopped reporting for work on May 14, 2012 without any authorisation or intimation. Four days later, the company dispatched a notice to him by registered post, calling upon him to explain his absence and warning that disciplinary action could follow. The notice was sent to his permanent address in Bihar -- the address furnished by Gupta himself at the time of his appointment.Gupta, however, claimed that he had gone on leave because his mother was seriously ill, that he had verbally informed his superior officer before leaving and that he later attempted to rejoin work but was not permitted to do so.The dispute eventually reached the labour court, which ruled in Gupta’s favour and directed his reinstatement along with back wages and consequential benefits. The Allahabad high court upheld the award, noting that the employer had sent the notice to Gupta’s permanent address in Bihar rather than the place where he was allegedly residing in Gautam Budh Nagar at the relevant time.Bur the Supreme Court disagreed. Rejecting the reasoning adopted by the high court, the bench held that the employer could not be blamed for communicating at the only address available in its records.The court found that Gupta had produced no evidence to show that he had informed the company about any change of address or that the employer was otherwise aware of his place of residence.The judgment also found serious deficiencies in the employee’s case. The bench noted that Gupta’s claim that he was compelled to leave because of his mother’s illness was entirely unsupported by documentary evidence. During the entire period of absence, he neither sent any written communication seeking leave nor furnished any material explaining his absence.“Had his explanation been genuine, he could have sent a letter or other written intimation. Having failed to do so, he cannot now rely solely on an oral assertion to justify his unauthorised absence,” it said.Holding that the labour court and the high court had granted relief despite the absence of evidence, the Supreme Court concluded that the employee had absented himself without authorisation, failed to explain his absence through any contemporaneous record and produced no proof of attempting to rejoin duty.“We find that the respondent-employee absented himself without authorisation, failed to send any written communication to his employer during his absence, has led no documentary evidence to explain his absence, and has produced no evidence of any attempt to rejoin duty,” said the bench, overturning the orders passed by the labour court in 2022 and by the Allahabad High Court next year.