SHAKUNTALA CHOPRA Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner, Smt. Shakuntia Chopra, is working as a Stenographer Grade III in the Principal Accounts Office of the Ministry of Commerce, New Delhi. She has been working there for the last six years or so. In 1982, the Assistant Controller of Accounts by letter dated 5th October, 1982 required her to appear at a special examination which was going to be held on 12th December, 1982 for the purpose of regularising her in service. She declined to appear at the examination. Her case is that she is not covered by the scheme which was devised in 1982 by the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms.

(2.) A large number of lower division clerks were working in various offices of the Government but they had not been drafted in the Central Secretariat Clerical Services. So a request was made by these people who were ad hoc appointees for their regularisation in the service in view of the fact that they had rendered a number of years service and had become overage to appear at any competitive examination. The Department of Personnel considered this request symnpathetically and devised the method of holding a special qualifying examination to determine the eligibility of these persons to become regular members of the Central Secretariat Civil Service. The same thing was done for various Stenographers who had been appointed on an ad hoc basis through the Employment Exchange. In order to become members of the Central Secretariat Stenographers Service (C.S.S.S), they were required to appear at this special examination on 12th December, 1982.

(3.) The Assistant Controller of Accounts thought that the petitioner was an ad hoc appointee and had been recruited through Employment Exchange and therefore in order to be eligible for C.S.S.S. she must appear at the special examination. But, as I have said, the petitioner refused to appear at the examination because she said that she was not governed by the scheme which I have outlined above. The Assistant Controller then by his letter dated 10-11-1982 threatened her that if she does not appear at the special qualifyins; examination "her services are liable to be terminated now under the provisions of C.C.S.(T.S.) Rules, 1965". The petitioner, therefore, brought this writ petition on 1-12-1982 questioning the legality of the decision of the Government in compelling her to appear at the special qualifying examination and the decision that she was an ad hoc appointee whose services were to be regularised in accordance with the memoranda of the Government of India dated 7th August, 1982 and 21st August, 1982, which contain the scheme of qualifying special examination.