RAVINDER KUMAR JHA Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners are aggrieved by an order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) dated 27-09-2012 in OA 248/2012. The present writ petitioners were impleaded as contesting respondents in those proceedings before the CAT. The original applicants (referred to as "the applicants") had filed the application, challenging the revision in seniority in the cadre of Upper Division Clerks (UDC) in the Central Secretariat Clerical Service (CSCS). By the impugned order, CAT accepted their contentions and allowed the application.

(2.) The parties belong to the CSCS, and are governed by the CSCS Rules, 1962. CSCS consists of two cadres, i.e. Lower Division clerks (LDCs), and Upper Division Clerks (UDCs), and a separate cadre Unit in respect of those two grades of CSCS exists for each Central Government Ministry. The select list for UDCs in each such cadre unit is determined by the Department of Personnel & Training ("DoPT"). All LDCs who have completed eight years approved service and possess the Benchmark "Good" in their Annual Confidential Reports/Annual Performance Appraisal Reports ("ACRs/APARs") are eligible for promotion as UDCs on seniority-cummerit basis. The CSCS Recruitment Rules (RRs) also provides for accelerated promotion to the UDCs' level. 75 % of UDCs vacancies are filled up by way of Seniority-cum-Merit (i.e. "seniority quota"), and the balance 25% UDC vacancies are filled up by way of a Limited Departmental Competitive Examination ("LDCE"), the eligibility criteria for which is five years of qualifying service, with no prescribed benchmark. LDCE is governed by the CSCS (Upper Division Grade LDCE) Regulations, 1966 ("LDCE Regulations"). LDCE promotees to the cadre of UDC do not have to wait for three more years for their turn for promotion by virtue of seniority-cum-merit quota (SQ) eligibility qualifying service, and can "jump" the queue, to occupy 25% of the vacancies in the cadre of UDCs. Those who do not appear in the LDCE tests, or are not successful in it, wait out their turn to become UDCs by virtue of seniority against the 75% seniority-cum-merit (SQ) quota for the recruitment to the UDCs grade, or might choose to take their chance in the next two LDCE processes conducted in between, after completion of their sixth and seventh years of service.

(3.) There was, apparently, acute stagnation in the posts of Deputy Secretary, Under Secretary, Section Officer and Assistants of Central Secretariat Service (hereafter referred to as "CSS") of the Central Government. To remove such stagnation in the cadres of CSS and CSCS, the Government of India decided in the year 2001 to re-structure the cadre of CSS, including its feeder cadre of CSCS. A Committee was constituted for this purpose and it submitted its report in February, 2002. The recommendations of the said Cadre Restructuring of CSS were considered by the DoPT, and some of the recommendations were placed before the Union Cabinet. The Cabinet approved these recommendations on 03.10.2003. Some of the recommendations approved by the Cabinet were (a) the creation of 10 posts in the grade of Director; (b) fixation of cadre strength of Deputy Secretary at 330 and Under Secretary at 1400 by creation of 54 posts; (c) fixation of cadre strength of Section Officers to 3000 by creating additional 1405 posts. No additional posts in the Assistants' grade was created, as the percolation of vacancies in the Assistants' grade and UDC grade from the additional posts created in higher posts was to remove the stagnation in these grades as well. This was mentioned in the Cabinet Note. Resultantly, an overall 1469 additional posts were created in 2003 in CSS and thereafter, the sanctioned strength of various posts in CSS fixed as on 03-10-2003 was as follows: (i) Director: 110; (ii) Dy. Director: 330; (iii) Under Secretary 1400; (iv) Section Officer 3000 (v) Assistants 4904 (No additional vacancies were created for this cadre).