VASANTRAI D JANIHVAR JANI Vs. DISTRICT PANCHAYAT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner was appointed as Junior Clerk in District Panchayat, Kutch on 01.11.1966. He was promoted as Senior Clerk on 21.01.1982. He was working in the Administrative Wing of the respondent Panchayat and retired from the post of Senior Clerk on 30.09.2000 on attaining the age of superannuation. In the year 1992, this petitioner had approached this Court by preferring a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India being Special Civil Application No.6128 of 1992, wherein the action of the respondent Panchayat, of allocating the petitioner from Administrative Wing to Accounts Wing was challenged. At the time of entertaining the petition, status quo was granted, which had continued during the pendency of the said petition and thus, the petitioner continued in administrative wing and retired from the post of Senior Clerk on 30.09.2000, as aforesaid. Since the petition was pending, the authorities did not promote him on higher post from the post of Senior Clerk and insisted that since the petitioner had not accepted the promotion in Accounts Wing and further since the issue was pending before the Court, nothing was done in view of the status quo granted by this Court.

(2.) THE said petition, i.e. Special Civil Application No.6128 of 1992 came to be allowed on 4.10.2002 by the judgment of this Court (Coram: Hon'ble Mr.Justice J.M.Panchal, as his Lordship then was). The relevant part of the judgment reads as under:-

(3.) IT is contended by learned Advocate for the petitioner that the petitioner was wrongly allocated to Accounts Wing of District Panchayat, Kutch and the petitioner had never done the accounts work, either as a Junior Clerk of as a Senior Clerk and according to him, the respondent authorities ought not to have allocated the petitioner in Accounts Wing from Administrative Wing. Be it noted that the controversy in the present petition is not whether the petitioner ought to have been continued in Administrative Wing or in Accounts Wing. That was the controversy in Special Civil Application No.6128 of 1992, but since that came to be finally heard and decided on 04.10.2002 and the petitioner had attained age of superannuation much before that, i.e. on 30.09.2000, this Court had thought it fit not to pronounce upon that issue, inter alia recording the fact that since status quo was granted in favour of the petitioner at the time of entertaining Special Civil Application No.6128 of 1992 and that the said status quo had continued all throughout the pendency of the said petition, in effect, the petitioner continued to be in Administrative Wing and the decision of the respondent authorities of treating the petitioner, having been allocated the Accounts Wing never came to be implemented. On the face of these undisputed facts as reflected in the judgment dated 04.10.2002, this Court in unequivocal terms, more particularly in para-4 of the said judgment, which is already reproduced hereinabove, inter alia observed and found that the case of the petitioner should have been considered for higher pay-scale of Rs.5000-8000.