KUALA LUMPUR: A former national tennis chief coach secured RM32,100 in compensation for wrongful dismissal from employment after the Malaysian Lawn Tennis Association failed to pay his full contractual wages for three consecutive months.
Industrial Court chairman Augustine Anthony described the association’s failure to pay Suresh Menon his full wages for June, July and August 2020 as “arbitrary” and “unjust”.
“The conduct of the (association) in treating the claimant (Menon) in this manner resulted in (his) unjust treatment despite the claimant having been appointed to a position of such great responsibility,” Anthony said in a 52-page award released on Tuesday.
He also said the association’s failure to pay Menon his monthly wage of US$5,000 breached a fundamental term of his employment contract.
Anthony noted from the evidence that Menon’s wages had been reduced to US$2,500 per month for April, May and June 2020 at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, with a review scheduled in June.
He said that Menon, in June 2020, wrote to the association president asking to be paid his full wages for the month since he had resumed his coaching duties full-time, but received no satisfactory response.
Anthony ruled that the association was obliged to restore the coach’s full wages beginning that month.
“When the (association) communicated to the claimant on July 24, 2020 that he would not be paid his contractual wages but only a reduced amount, it amounted to a breach of a fundamental term of the claimant’s contract, entitling the claimant to claim that he was constructively dismissed,” the award read.
Anthony said the association’s claim that Menon had tendered his resignation in January 2020 was unsupported by evidence.
“The claimant had intimated to the (association) that he would tender his resignation.
“However, events superseded the claimant’s intention and he continued to perform his duties as the national head coach,” said Anthony.
The court also dismissed a “bold” claim put forward by the association that Menon was not its employee. Following a detailed analysis of various clauses in the two contracts entered between Menon and the association, Anthony said:
“Upon the analysis of both the contracts, this court is of the view that (they) are unmistakably contracts of service.
“Based on the contracts signed, the (association) had intended and has treated the claimant as an employee.”
Premised on that finding, Anthony ruled that Menon was a “workman” within the provisions of the Industrial Relations Act 1967 and entitled to file representations under Section 20 to protest his wrongful dismissal.
Anthony also found that Menon had performed well as an employee.
First appointed to the position on a short-term, four-month contract at the beginning of 2019, Menon was rewarded with a second contract for what Anthony described as an “impressive length” of 17 months, which was later shortened by mutual consent to expire on Aug 31, 2020.
Anthony ordered the association to pay Menon a total of RM32,100, being the ringgit equivalent of the total unpaid balance of his wages for June, July and August 2020.
Menon had coached the national squad between 1993 and 1995. Prior to that, he coached the Indonesian national team from 1989 to 1992.
He also served as the International Tennis Federation’s development officer for Asia from 1996 to 2017.
Lawyers Ramesh Sivakumar and Calvin Lim represented Menon while Justin Lee of the Malaysian Employers’ Federation appeared for the association. - FMT
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