MANOJ KUMAR JINDAL Vs. RAJNI MAHAJAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The order passed by the Division Bench of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana upholding the order passed by the Single Bench is under challenge before this Court. It is a case in which the appellant as well as the respondent No.1 are serving in Department of Technical Education and Industrial Training, Punjab. The root cause of the litigation was an order dtd. 8/11/2007 vide which the respondent No.1 was reverted from the post of senior lecturer to that of lecturer. The Single Bench of the High Court set aside that order. The same was upheld in intra-court appeal before the Division Bench.

(2.) The respondent No.1 was promoted as senior lecturer vide Memo dtd. 16/5/2007. A notice dtd. 9/9/2007 was served upon the respondent No.1 to show-cause as to why she should not be revered back to the post of lecturer. An interim reply was furnished by her on 17/9/2007, seeking liberty to furnish detailed reply after getting copies of the relevant documents.

(3.) Without affording her opportunity to file a detailed reply, vide impugned order, she was ordered to be reverted to the post of lecturer. The respondent No.1 as well as the appellant were working as lecturers. The respondent No.1 was senior to the appellant. The post of senior lecturer became available on 31/5/2006. A meeting of Departmental Promotion Committee (DPC) was held on 15/3/2007 wherein the respondent No.1 was recommended to be given promotion. She joined as senior lecturer on 17/3/2007. A notice was served upon her to show-cause as to why she should not be revered back to the post of lecturer vide order dtd. 8/11/2007. Her order of promotion was withdrawn. It is the aforesaid said order, which was impugned before the High Court. The reason for reversion was that she did not have requisite benchmark at the time when the vacancy became available. However, there is no dispute that when the candidates were considered for promotion and the DPC held on 15/3/2007, the respondent No.1 was having the requisite benchmark and was recommended to be promoted. The learned Single Bench opined that the ACRs for five years preceding the date of consideration for promotion were to be taken into account and not from the date of accrual of the vacancy.