The Kerala High Court in the case of S. Kuttappan Chettiar vs Deputy Labour Commissioner, Thiruvananthapuram & Ors.WP(C) No. 28199/2025 decided on October 7, 2025 (2025 LLR WEB 543) has reiterated that orders passed by the Controlling Authority under the Payment of Gratuity Act can only be challenged before the Appellate Authority and not directly before the High Court.
The petitioner, a charitable trust, had moved the High Court challenging gratuity awards in favour of its former employees, alleging procedural errors and misclassification of wages. It admitted, however, that no statutory appeal was filed due to financial constraints.
Also read – Gratuity Act Prevails Over Service Regulations: MP High Court
Justice K. Babu dismissed the petitions, noting that the Act provides a specific appellate remedy under Section 7 (7), which must be exhausted before invoking writ jurisdiction. The court emphasized that writ intervention is not warranted when an effective statutory remedy exists.
“Financial hardship cannot be an excuse to bypass the statutory appeal mechanism,” the court noted, while granting the petitioner liberty to file delayed appeals, excluding the time spent in the writ proceedings.
(Compiled from 2025 LLR Web Reports )
