JUDGMENT V. K. Mehrotra, J. - This petition under Article 226 of the Constitution assails an award dated 6 November 1976 of the Labour Court, Gorakhpur, in adjudication case No. 49 of 1975. By this award, the Labour Court declined to grant relief to the petitioner-union of the workmen employed with Sethi Flour Mills (Private), Ltd. (respondent 3), that the concerned workmen continued to be in continuous employment irrespective of the transfer of the undertaking to the third respondent by its earlier owner Bajaj Flour Mills. The case of the petitioner is that even after the transfer of the undertaking to the third respondent, the workmen continued to serve on the terms and conditions on which they were serving the transferor, namely, Bajaj Flour Mills and there was no interruption in their service. Nearly six months after the transfer, the third respondent required the workmen to fill in new agreement forms under which the workmen were to become employees of the third respondent from the date of the transfer of the undertaking to it. Several workmen filled in this form but not the concerned workmen, whose names are contained in the annexure to the order of reference which was subsequently made about the dispute by the State Government. 2. The case set up by the third respondent is that even though a formal deed of transfer under which they had purchased the under. taking came to be executed on 23 March 1974, they had taken possession of the undertaking on 12 November 1973, and had the same day notified that they were the new owners of the undertaking and that they would be prepared to employee afresh the existing workmen on terms and conditions which were not less favourable than the ones on which the workmen were working with Bajaj Flour Mills. Their case further is that they never agreed to give continuity of service to these workmen and that the relief, if any, in respect of retrenchment compensation, etc., of the workmen concerned, could be claimed against Bajaj Flour Mills. The workmen, according to the plea of the third respondent, were not entitled to any declaration that they were in employment of the third respondent on the basis that their services had been continuous and had not been interrupted by the transfer of the undertaking to the third respondent. 3. The workmen, according to the plea of the third respondent, were not entitled to any declaration that they were in employment of the third respondent on the basis that their services had been continuous and had not been interrupted by the transfer of the undertaking to the third respondent. 3. When efforts at conciliation failed, the State Government made a reference in exercise of powers under Section 4K of the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Disputes Act. The dispute so referred was whether the concerned workmen, nine in number, were to be treated to be in continuous and uninterrupted service with effect from various dates of their employment by the transferor and, if so, to what relief were they entitled. 4. Parties put forward their respective versions in the form of their written statements and also adduced evidence before the Labour Court. On a consideration of the material on record, t he Labour Court came to the conclusion that the third respondent had notified en the date that it took over the undertaking that it would employ the existing workmen afresh on terms and conditions which were not adverse as compared to those on which they were hitherto before working with the transferor. In the opinion of the Labour Court, the transfer resulted, in law, to a retrenchment of the workmen employed by Bajaj Flour Mills and that the concerned workmen could, therefore, seek their remedy in regard to retrenchment compensation, etc., from them in accordance with law. They were not entitled, according to the Labour Court, to the declaration sought by them. 5. It was urged by Sri K.P. Agarwal, appearing for the petitioner, that in view of the fact that the concerned workmen continued to work with the new employer uninterruptedly on the same terms and conditions on which they were working with Bajaj Flour Mills and also in view of the fact that the third respondent never notified to them that they would not be treated as being in continuous and uninterrupted employment, the workmen were entitled to the declaration sought by them and the Labour Court erred in taking a view to the contrary. It has further been urged that Section 25FF of the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, having been enacted for the benefit of the workmen, it was incumbent upon the third respondent, as a transferee from the old employer, to have notified that it was not treating the workmen of the transferor to be in continuous and uninterrupted service. The submission also is that by a mere change in ownership, there was no change in the establishment itself and that the workmen concerned being employees in the establishment could not be held to have lost continuity of their service. 6. From the impugned award, it appears that the parties were at issue on the question as to whether the third respondent had intimated the workmen at all about employing them afresh. Believing the evidence of the third respondent, the Labour Court held that a notice had been put up by the third respondent when it assumed charge of the undertaking that the workmen who intended to continue in service should fill in a new form. On this finding, it is clear that as far as the third respondent is concerned, it could not be said to have acquiesced in the position that it had undertaken to treat the services of the workmen of the former employer as continuous and uninterrupted. The deed of transfer, dated 23 March 1974, has not been filed by any of the parties in this petition. It is not, therefore, possible to find out with exactitude the terms upon which the third respondent had taken over the workmen of the transferor. 7. The submission that notwithstanding the change of the owner, the establishment remained the same so that the continuity of the service of the workmen was not broken cannot be countenanced for no such plea admittedly was raised before the Labour Court, nor any material brought on record before it, to enable it to examine this aspect of the matter. S. It is true that Section 25FF of the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, primarily is for the benefit of the workmen, yet, as far as the transferor is concerned, the proviso to that section affords it protection in the matter of retrenchment benefits admissible to workmen on fulfilment of the terms envisaged by the third clause thereof. S. It is true that Section 25FF of the Uttar Pradesh Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, primarily is for the benefit of the workmen, yet, as far as the transferor is concerned, the proviso to that section affords it protection in the matter of retrenchment benefits admissible to workmen on fulfilment of the terms envisaged by the third clause thereof. Read as a whole, the provision of Section 25FF do not lead to a construction that the transferee-employer is called upon to declare, on its own, to the workmen employed in the undertaking acquired by it from the erst-while owner, that it had agreed to treat their services to be continuous and uninterrupted. 8. Having regard to the main question on which the parties were at issue and the finding arrived at by the Labour Court, it is clear that the award impugned in the present petition cannot be said to suffer from any manifest error of law so as to merit interference. It appears that the workmen rushed prematurely into raising this dispute about the continuous and uninterrupted nature of their service at the stage at which they did so. 9. The petition fails and is dismissed but, in the circumstances, without any order as to costs.