SADASHIV VIRTUJI PETKAR Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Petitioner by the present petition, impugns the order dated 3. 3. 1777 passed in Original application No. 263 of 1993.

(2.) THE Petitioner had filed Original Application challenging the order dated 21. 1. 1991 by which respondent Nos. 5 and and herein were promoted as director of Education and the petitioner was denied promotion. The case of the Petitioner as argued before the Respondent Tribunal Mas that the adverse entries were never communicated to him and consequently his down grading by Respondent No. 4 herein was illegal. As the adverse entries were taken into consideration he was denied promotion. The second challenge was that Respondent No. 2 ought not to have been a member of the establishment Board which considered the promotion in question as the Respondent No. 2 was the reviewing officer for the annual confidential reports of the Respondent No. 6. Apart from that it Mas also contended that the constitution of the board was also contrary to the provisions of the government resolution dated 17. 1. 1985 as there was no member from the S. C. community on the board.

(3.) DEALING with the contentions in so far as communication of adverse remarks, the Tribunal after perusing the records, recorded a finding that the contention of the Petitioner that he was down graded by Respondent No. 4 is not borne by the record and factually Respondent No. 4 did not down grade the petitioner herein. The Tribunal also noted that they have perused the records of the petitioner for not only five years as considered by the Establishment Board but also his confidential reports for the previous years. The Tribunal held that the Petitioner Mas assessed as good officer through out except for one year when he was considered as very good officer. The tribunal had noted that as per the rules, in order to give promotion from Class I Post to another post in class I, the bench mark should be "an outstanding worker". The Petitioner was having an assessment that of being "good". Selection of the officers was done from amongst those who had been assessed as A i. e. outstanding and out of them one belonged to the backward community. It Mas also noted the fact that the Petitioner belonged to SC was taken note of by the Selection Board but inspire of that they were not in a position to make his selection as he was not assessed as outstanding. On that count, the first challenge Mas rejected. Dealing with the second contention that the Respondent No. 2 ought not to have been a member of the establishment board, it is noted that the respondent No. 2 was invited by the Board at the time of making selection as she happened to be the secretary of the Education Department. It is then noted that from the minutes of the Board, it cannot be said that the presence of the said officer had any effect on the selection and merely because she happened to be reviewing officer of one of the candidate) it Mas not possible to hold that she ought not to have been a member of the Committee and in fact she Mas not a member of the committee but only an invitee. That contention was also rejected. The Constitution of the Board Mas the next challenge which was considered and the tribunal held that the inference can be drawn that no schedule caste member was available and in these circumstances held that there was no member of the scheduled caste on the board and that the petitioner had not discharged the burden that a member was available. For all the aforesaid reasons, the Original Application Mas rejected.