Birla Textiles shifted out of the capital after the Supreme Court had ruled that all polluting units should be re-located to reduce environmental pollution caused by the leakage of gas and other fumes from such industries.In its judgment, a division bench comprising justice S Saghir Ahmed and justice MJ Rao on Friday said that employees who do not join duty on these two dates would be deemed to have been retrenched as on November 30, 1996, (when all the polluting units were shut down subsequent to the apex court ruling) and would be entitled to compensation equivalent to an year's salary and other benefits as provided for by the court's judgment of July 8, 1996.

The court directed the labourcommissioners of Delhi and Himachal Pradesh to be present at Baddi on the two dates, to supervise and check the authenticity of Birla Textiles' workers.

The workers would carry their factory identification card which would entitle them to resume their duties, the court said. The direction came on the hearing of a public interest petition filed by the workers of Birla through their counsel Ashok Aggarwal seeking payment of full salary from December 1, 1996, and the date the factory would start functioning at the new site.

Aggarwal had argued that in the absence of the operational unit, the workers should not be forced to report on duty at the new site as a pre-condition for payment of their salary.