R M JOSHI Vs. RESERVE BANK OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The question referred to the Full Bench, in view of apparent lack of agreement among certain decisions of this court, is whether the "Reserve Bank: of India (Staff) Regulations, 1948" are statutory in character or not.

(2.) . The background of the reference is that certain direct recruits in Grade A in the service of the Reserve Bank have filed writ petition Nos. 876 and 1029 of 1974 for enforcing against the Reserve Bank and the promotees certain alleged rights based on the right of equality guaranteed by the Constitution and by the Staff Regulations. The preliminary objection taken by the Bank is that the writ petitions are not maintainable as the obligations alleged to be binding on the Bank and sought to be enforced by the writ petitions are purely contractual in nature. The Staff Regulations framed administratively by the Bank have at their end Form A, which is a declaration to be bound by the Staff Regulations in the following words :

(3.) . The question whether the Staff Regulations are statutory or contractual may be one of fact, but the rights which flow from the relationship between the petitioners and the Bank may still be constitutional and not merely contractual the former being still enforceable under Article 226 of the Constitution. As pointed out in Roshan Lal Tandon v. Union of India, (1968) I SCR 185 (1) at 195, "the origin of Government service is contractual ....But once appointed to his post or office the Government servant acquires a status." If the employer is a "public authority", the meaning of which is discussed in 30 Halsbury's Laws of England, Third Edition, pages 682 onwards, the question whether the status of its employees is contractual or statutory would depend on the provisions of the statute constituting the said authority. As observed in Ved Prakash Malhotra v. State Bank of India and another, ILR (1974) I Delhi 660 (2) at 664, referring to J. C. Sachdev v. Reserve Bank of India, (1973) 11 LLJ 204 (3), at 217, the Reserve Bank is "a State" under Article 12 of the Constitution. Of course, the State or a public authority may appoint its employees in the exercise of any of the three following powers, namely, (1) statutory, (2) cxccusive and (3) contractual.