AROOR CHAND Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgment shall dispose of Civil Writ Petitions No. 5752, 4138 of 1981, 3099, 4842, 4843 of 1982 and C.W.P. No. 9186 of 1989 as common question of law and fact is involved in all these writ petitions. The facts are taken from C.W.P. No. 4842 of 1982.

(2.) Petitioners joined service under the State of Punjab as Drivers, Conductors, Carpenters, Assistants, Clerks and Electricians etc. on different dates. Petitioners continued to serve under the State of Punjab from the dates of their appointments till the State of Punjab took a policy decision to transfer some of the buses to Municipal Corporations, Amritsar, Jalandhar and Ludhiana. The staff which was necessary for running those buses was transferred from Punjab Roadways and the services of such staff were placed at the disposal of the said corporations. Some of the petitioners were transferred to the Municipal Corporations on options and the other petitioners were transferred to the Corporations being the junior most in the respective depots as otherwise they had to face retrenchment due to the decrease of posts on the transfer of vehicles to the Municipal Corporations along with the operation. Several writ petitions were filed by the affected employees in this Court on the ground that the conditions of service of the Municipal Corporations were not the same as those were of the Punjab Roadways. The petitioners alleged that the conditions of service were less advantageous in the corporations as compared to the conditions of service in the Punjab Roadways.

(3.) One such writ petition No. 4350 of 1980 reported in Ajmer Lal v. State of Punjab,1981 2 SLR 775 came up for hearing before learned Single Judge of this Court which was decided on 25.5.1981. This was a case of those employees whose options had not been taken and their services had been transferred by the State of Punjab of its own. Learned Single Judge held that the services of the employees with the State Government came to an end with the passing of this order and the status of the petitioners as civil servants stood extinguished. It was further held that rule 3.17 of the Punjab Civil Services Vol. I Part-I provides that a government servant could be transferred either on account of inefficiency or misbehaviour or on his written request. Since the employees had not given their consent and were not found guilty of misconduct or inefficiency, they could not be transferred by the State to the Municipal Corporations. The order was held to be illegal and beyond jurisdiction.