SANJOY MITRA Vs. KHALIL AHMED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Above two applications were filed on March 17, 2006 and March 21, 2007 respectively by the applicants inter alia, praying for clarification and/or modification of my order dated February 14, 2006 for fixing an outermost time limit for compliance of the said order and to clarify whether by the said order dated February 14, 2006 I held the respondents guilty of contempt of Court respectively.

(2.) Judgment and order dated February 14, 2006 was passed by me, while disposing of a contempt proceeding being CPAN 1729 of 2005. By the said judgment and order I disposed of the contempt proceeding after holding that the respondents/contemnors therein from time to time not only misled this Court from one stage to the other but also attempted to withhold the process of consideration of the writ petitioners for employment in compassionate category of land losers despite orders of Court. Even after holding the same, I did not proceed as against them to punish them under the Contempt of Court Act as I wanted to give them one more opportunity to comply with the orders of this Court. I did not deliberately fix any time schedule as I thought good sense would prevail upon the high officials of the State who would comply with the orders in no time.

(3.) I feel that instead of reiterating the facts once again for convenience let my judgment and order dated February 14, 2006 be reproduced below :- "For the purpose of setting up Bakreswar Thermal Power Station huge area under the District of Birbhum was acquired by the State resulting in loss of agricultural land as well as the homestead of the villegers in a substantial part of the said district. The State Government decided to give employment at least one from each land Ioser's family. A committee was set up under the Chairmanship of the District Magistrate for preparation of a panel of land losers. The said committee consisted of several members from different field including representative of West Bengal Power Development Corporation Ltd. (Hereinafter referred to as "WBPDCL") under whose control the said thermal power station was set up and put under opertaion. On October 17, 1977 the Labour Department of the State of West Bengal issued a notification, wherein all Government employments including employment in /oca/ bodies and Government undertakings were directed to be routed throuh employment exchange and the employment exchange was asked to categorize, inter alia the persons who were uprooted from their homestead or whose agricultural land was taken away by the Government for developmental work in various parts of the Slate. Those persons were placed by the employment exchange in a special category named as "Exempted Category''. 30% of vacancies were earmarked and reserved for exempted category candidate by a subsequent notification dated April 27, 1979. On October 14, 1980 the Government made provisions for direct absorption of the land losers with any reference to the employment exchange. There were subsequent circulars favouring consideration of appointment of the eligible candidates from the uprooted families of various parts of the State. 52 writ petitioners listed their names in such category subject to scrutiny of the special committee formed therefor under the chairmanship of the concerned District Magistrate. Even then they were not being considered for employment. They approached this Court by filing W. P. No. 1 5428 (W) of 1998 wherein Altamas Kabir, J. (as His Lordship then was) by His Lordship's judgment and order dated November 24, 1998 disposed of the said writ petition by recording the submission of learned Counsel appearing for WBPDCL to the effect that "after following the procedure for empanelment of such land losers with the intention providing employment, the names of the petitioners have already been empanelled and they will be provided with employment as and when their turn comes according to serial number in the panel". On a plain reading of the said order it is clear that according to WBPDCL all writ petitioners in the said writ petition had already been empanelled and they would be provided employment as and when their turn came. Employment was, however, not given to those 52 writ petitioners despite series of representations made from time to time in this regard. Real game started thereafter. A cooperative society was formed in Bakreswar with several land losers as well as outsiders from the neighbouring villages belonging to a particular political party to which the petitioners did not belong. The said cooperative society was entrusted by WBPDCL to supply unskilled labourers for working in the plant. From the original list 45 persons were given appointment without following seniority. It was alleged by the petitioners that they were superceded as they belonged to a particular political party opposing the present Government in the State. There had been series of meetings and representations to resolve the controversy. However, nothing fruitful happened. Second writ petition was filed on May 16, 2003 being W.P. No. 7976 of 2003. The writ petition was initially moved before Bhaskar Bhattacharjee, J. His Lordship by an order dated May 23, 2003 restrained WBPDCL from appointing any unskilled labour without considering the eligible petitioners. Matter thereafter came up before Arun Kumar Mitra, J. after change of determination when His Lordship extended the interim order passed by Bhaskar Bhattacharjee, J. His Lordship also directed the District Magistrate to prepare a list as per the scheme and send the same to the concerned employment exchange. The District Magistrate was asked to submit a report to the Court. His Lordship reiterated that no appointment would be given by the company till the report of the District Magistrate was considered by the Court and necessary order was passed thereon. The matter again appeared before His Lordship on September 23, 2003 when His Lordship recorded that the District Magistrate despite order of this Court did not submit any report. An application for vacating the interim order was made by WBPDCL which was heard by Jayanta Kumar Biswas, J. on December 16, 2004 when His Lordship gave direction for filing affidavits. The matter thereafter came to me for hearing. I heard this writ petition. In course of hearing I passed an order dated February 24, 2005 when it was submitted on behalf of WBPDCL that they wanted to engage unskilled labour through contractor and for that they floated a tender. The petitioners informed the Court they also applied for setting up a labour cooperative society to which I directed Mr. Fajlul Haque, learned Counsel appearing for the State to take instruction from the Cooperative Department with regard to the registration of the petitioners' cooperative society. The writ petition along with the application for vacating the interim order was ultimately disposed of by me by my judgment and order dated March 17, 2005. I recorded that District Magistrate submitted a report in Court wherein it appeared that out of 52 writ petitioners one appeared before the District Magistrate. As such he was unsuccessful in completing the process of scrutiny. I also recorded the submission of the same learned Counsel appearing for the WBPDCL who made earlier submission before Altamas Kabir, J. (as His Lordship then was) to the effect that WBPDCL was in dare need of manpower to complete the extension programme which they had undertaken with foreign collaborator and because of the order of Injunction they could not proceed in the matter. An impression was given to me as if WBPDCL intended to appoint unskilled labour force which could not be possible firstly because of the order of injunction and secondly because of the non-cooperation on the part of the petitioners in having their cases scrutinized and considered by the District Magistrate. Considering such submission I observed that the controversy could only be resolved by the District Magistrate by preparing a list in terms of the circular dated August 21, 2002 as directed by this Court in order dated August 18, 2003. I also observed that question of discrimination would be academic in case District Magistrate completes the process of preparation of the list in terms of the earlier direction of the Court. I also directed the writ petitioners to cooperate with the District Magistrate in this regard. I framed a time schedule within which the District Magistrate would send a list to the Director of Employment Exchange for empanelling the writ petitioners in exempted category by the employment exchange so that the employment exchange could recommend those names to WBPDCL maintaining seniority and WBPDCL could in turn give employment adhering to the list to be sent by the Employment Exchange. I passed an order of injunction restraining WBPDCL to engage any other person in the category of unskilled labour without following the procedure laid down in the notification dated August 21, 2002. The respondent authorities changed their modus operandi. Initially before Altamas Kabir, J. they made a statement that they would absorb all the writ petitioners in accordance with seniority. They later on changed their stand to the effect that it must be routed through the committee and Employment Exchange. The second writ application was disposed of by me by the directing the District Magistrate to complete the process. The District Magistrate ultimately completed the process, as it now appears, preparing a list of only 8 persons out of 52 writ petitioners. Why others were not listed and why they were not considered in land losers category is, however, unknown. At least this Court was kept in dark. Contempt application was filed before me. The matter was taken up by me on January 17, 2006 when I directed affidavits to be filed and ultimately matter was heard on 2nd February, 2006. In course of hearing, learned Counsel for the WBPDCL handed over a list of 8 persons which was forwarded by the District Magistrate to the Director of Employment Exchange vide his letter dated 27th July, 2005 being eligible to be empanelled. In course of hearing Mr. Fajlul Haque, learned Counsel appearing for the District Magistrate produced in Court a separate list containing names of 6 persons eligible for being enrolled in exempted category. Comparing these two lists it would appear that two common names were recommended in both the lists. Why other six names were removed from the first list and four new persons were subsequently included is a question whose answer is not known. On perusal of the pleadings filed earlier in the writ proceeding and in this contempt proceeding and on an analysis of the facts it appears to me that WBPDCL changed its stand before this Court from time to time. Such analysis of the chronological events is set down below :-