CHANDRASHEKAHAR SHANKARRO ZADE Vs. ADDITIONAL COLLECTOR NAGPUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this writ petition the petitioners, who had been appointed as primary teachers and peons by the second respondent Municipal Council, question the validity of the orders passed by the first respondent, Additional Collector, on 7-9-1983 and the consequential order passed by the Municipal Council on 13-9-1983 cancelling their appointments. The facts leading to the present petition briefly stated are as follows.

(2.) An administrator has been appointed under sub-section (1) of Section 48-A of the Maharashtra Municipalities Act, 1965 (hereinafter referred to as 'the Act') to manage the affairs of the Respondent No. 2 Municipal Council. By virtue of sub-section (2) of Section 48-A, he is entrusted with all the powers and duties of the Council and its various authorities under the Act or any other law for the time being in force. On 4-7-1983 the Administrator issued advertisement for recruiting teachers for Marathi and Urdu Primary Schools run by the Muncipal Council and also for peons. The advertisement stated that the candi- dates must have registered their names with the Employment Exchange and that Scheduled Caste and Backward Classes candidates would be given preference. for these posts. By his orders passed on 29-7-1983, the Administrator appointed petitioners Nos. 1 to 7 as teachers and by further orders passed on 1-8-1983, he appointed petitioners Nos. 8 to 13 as peons. These appointments were purely temporary and were liable to be terminated without any notice.

(3.) Some citizens of Narkhed by their application dated 18-8-1983, moved the Collector at Nagpur to suspend the orders of the appointment of the petitioners. Their grievance was that these appointments were made in contravention of the rules and arbitrarily. The first respondent, i. e. the Additional Collector, Nagpur took cognizance of this complaint, purporting to act under Section 308 of the Act. By his communication dated 30-8-1983 he called upon the Administrator to submit the relevant record pertaining to the appointments and further directed him to stay the implementation, operation and effect of the orders of appoit tment and restore the status quo until the said complaint was finally disposed of. In pursuance of this direction from the Additional Collector, staying the "operation and effect" of the orders of appointment of the petitioners, the Administrator stayed the operation of the orders of appointment. The Additional Collector recorded his order on the said complaint on 7-9-1983 and thereby cancelled the appointments of the petitioners. In doing so, the Additional Collector held that petitioners No. 1 to 7 had been appointed as Teachers without any posts of Assistant Teachers being created and that interviewing and appointing candidates other than those sponsored by the Employment Exchange was unjustifiable and was in contravention of the Government Resolution dated 7-10-1980 which applied to the local self Government also. The Additional Collector further held that although there was backlog in the posts reserved for backward classes, the appointments of candidates from other classes had been made thus contravening another Government Order.