UNION OF INDIA Vs. R D NANJIAH

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The judgment under appeal after certificate of fitness of the case under Article 133 (1) (c) of the Constitution of India, is very short as it purports to follow the ratio decidendi of Union of India v. G. M. Shankariah, 1969 Serv LR 1 = (Civil Appeals Nos. 1439 and 1446 of 1967, decided on 16-10-1968) (SC), where this Court had held, upon a concession by the Attorney General, that a list prepared under Section 115 of the States Reorganisation Act. 1956 (hereinafter referred to as the Act), was provisional. Therefore, it is was held that the writ petition was premature as the final list of officers on an integrated seniority list was still to be prepared after hearing objections.

(2.) The High Court of Mysore seems to have been under the misapprehension that the case now before us is also governed by what was held by this Court in Shankariah's case (supra) with reference to an entirely different and provisional list of Forest Officers. The case now before us pertains to Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Services of the Mysore State in which the petitioner was given, in the final integration list, a position to which he objected. Apparently, the petitioner, whose date of birth is given as 28th June, 1915, has retired. He is a respondent who has not appeared before us, and, therefore, could not be heard by us. We have, however, gone through his petition and the affidavit filed in its support where, in paragraph 16, he states as follows:

(3.) It is apparent that the petitioner-respondent was claiming relief against the final Inter-State seniority list although he was given due opportunity to object to the provisional list. Mrs. Shyamala Pappu, who has looked up the departmental records, informs us that the petitioner was given ample opportunity to file his objections to the preliminary list.