P.SENTHILVELAN Vs. TAMIL UNIVERSITY

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These Writ Petitions have been filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India praying for the issuance of a Writ of Declaration declaring that the action of the respondent in not regularizing the services of the petitioners on par with and from the date on which other similarly placed employees were regularized and regularizing their services only with effect from 19.05.2006 as illegal, arbitrary and discriminatory and consequently direct the respondent to regularize their services with time scale of pay and all other consequential benefits, from the date on which the other similarly placed persons were regularized, award costs.

(2.) The case of the petitioners is that the respondent University was started in the year 1981. The conditions of service for both Teaching Staff and Non-Teaching Staff are governed by the provisions of the Tamil University Act and the Statutes framed there under. Further, the Syndicate is vested with the power to determine and fix the conditions of service of the staff. The respondent University instead of appointing regular non-Teaching Staff with time scale of pay in the sanctioned posts and vacancies and by creating new posts, based on the requirement of staff strength, the respondent University started appointing persons to various Group-D Non-Teaching Staff posts on daily rated wages from the year 1984. The persons who were appointed initially on daily rated basis were later on brought to consolidated pay. Though the work was permanent, perennial and continuous in nature, the respondent University used to issue them appointment orders on consolidated pay for a fixed period of six months and they used to extend and issue fresh appointment orders at the end of every six months.

(3.) The petitioners were also appointed initially on daily rated wages (NMR) on various dates and later on consolidated pay with effect from 27.12.1994 in Group-D Non-Teaching Staff post/Gardener. From the date of his initial appointment, he was continuously employed without any break. Number of such consolidated pay Group-D Non- Teaching Staff strength as in the year 1997, including the petitioner was 84. All the consolidated pay Group-D Non-Teaching Staff including the petitioner made a demand for regularization of their services to the respondent. The respondent University agreed in principle to regularize the services of 84 Group-D Non-Teaching Staff and sought for approval from the Government to regularize the services of all the 84 Group-D Non-Teaching Staff, including the petitioner.