Workspace null in SOAPUI while running from unix

i am trying to run below :

project = testRunner.getTestCase().getTestSuite().getProject().getWorkspace().getProjectByName("Automation Base")

While this runs successfully when i do it from SOAPUI GUI but when i am triggering same script from unix, its not returning workspace.

testRunner.getTestCase().getTestSuite().getProject().getWorkspace() is null.