About Major Basic Steps Before Initiating Settlement Under18(1)

What are the main basic steps to be taken by principal employer before doing settlement under 18(1) of Industrial dispute act,1948?

By principal employer, you must be meaning the employer only.First you need to have clarity about these concepts since they have specific meanings in law, since a principal employer in law does not mean an immediate employer.Now. the basic steps that precede a settlement under Sec.18(1) of teh ID Act are :
1) there must be some demands from the union regarding terms of employment or conditions of service of workmen.
2) there must be negotiation between the management and the union on such demands.
3) there must be an agreement on all or on some of the demands between the management and the union.
4) the management and the union shall agree that the matters with regard to which there is as an agreement, shall be deemed to have been settled.
5) The agreement shall be reduced to writing in the form of settlement to be signed by the representatives of management and the union authorized to do so.
Hope this answers your question.
B.Saikumar
In-House HR & IR Advisor

Mere reading between the lines of Sec. 18(1) may not serve your purpose. In fact the whole of Chapter IV of the ID Act pertaining to the "Procedure and powers of the various authorities," need be read before making any interpretation of Sec. 18(1), ibid. Section 18(1) merely states about the persons on whom settlements and awards are binding, and speaks only about settlement and awards which have alrady been arrived at or granted by the competent authority and have to be enforced. Section 11, ibid, provided details about the "procedure and powers of conciliation officers, Boards, Courts and Tribunals," after observing of which settlements and awards are made.

Sec.18 (1) settlement is a mutual settlement between employer and an employee/employees/union representatives.
It should be in Form-H , the terms and settlement details should be written down clearly specifying the period of settlement.
After verification, both parties should sign in the settlement with witnesses.
A copy of the same should also to be submitted to the Labour Department Authorities for Registration in their office.

I think learned friends M/s Saikumar, Dhingra and Gurumurthy have explained the pre-requisites, form and enforceablity of a settlement arrived at under Sec.18(1) of the I.D Act,1947.As Dhingra rightly pointed out, the proper understanding of this type of bilateral agreement popularly called as " Sec.18(1) settlement " would be possible only from a conjunctive reading of the sections noted by him. Particularly, the definition of the term 'settlement' u/s 2(p) is of wider import to the present discussion as it stipulates certain essential conditions from which a mere bilateral agreement becomes a settlement.