UNION OF INDIA Vs. SUSHMA KATYAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The judgment of the learned Tribunal which is impugned in this writ petition is dated 19th September, 2001 passed in Original Application No.1132/99. By the said order, the Original Application filed by the respondents herein was allowed. This brief order reads as under:

(2.) As the learned Tribunal only extended the benefit of judgment in G.L.Madan's case (supra), it would be necessary to find out the issue which was decided in the G.L.Madan's case (supra). The applicants in the aforesaid case were LDCs who were promoted to the posts of the Assistants on adhoc basis. They belonged to Central Secretariat Services Cadre and were governed by the Central Secretariat Services Rules, 1962 (for short 'CSS Rules'). The respondents therein prepared a list of UDCs for the purpose of regular promotions to the posts of Assistants and sought to revert those applicants who were working as Assistants on adhoc basis. The validity of the seniority list of the UDCs as well as their threatened reversion was challenged by the said applicants. The plea of the applicants was that even for the purpose of temporary promotions a common seniority list had to be prepared from amongst of the members of the service in UDC grade in all the cadres in the Secretariat, namely, of all the Ministries, by the Department of Personnel and Training which is the cadre controlling authority and on the basis of their relative seniority of the members, promotions/transfers etc.should be effected. As a corollary even for the purpose of reversion of an Assistant on adhoc promotion, the same common seniority list had to be followed and only the junior most member of the service should be reverted first. They contended that the individual Ministry could not be treated as a separate cadre either for the purpose of promotion or for reversion. The respondents' case was, that the posts of Section Officers and Assistants were decentralised into 33 cadres comprising one or more Ministry/Department. Depending upon existence of the vacancies in each cadre, the Department of Personnel and Training compiles and intimates the Staff Selection Commission as to the number of vacancies to be filled up against 50% vacancies quota meant for promotion as per Rule 13 (6) of the CSS Rules. The respondents further explained that as the process for making regular appointment/recruitment takes some time the cadre controlling authority can make adhoc arrangements by promoting UDCs on adhoc basis subject to their eligibility/fitness for specified period or till the vacancies are filled up on a regular basis whichever is earlier. These adhoc appointments were resorted as stop-gap arrangement which is purely fortuitous and cannot give rise to any claim to seniority/regular appointment in that grade. Such appointments are terminated when regular officers become available to fill up the vacancies. After a detailed discussion, the learned Tribunal gave judgment dated 28th November, 2000 accepting the contention of the applicants therein. It held;

(3.) Obviously, the case of the respondents herein in Original Application No.1132/99 was identical and that led the learned Tribunal to pass the brief order extending the benefits in the case of G.L.Madan (supra).