SUBHASH KAUSHAL Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner, who is admittedly in P. C. M. S. (Class II) and had acquired her M. S. qualification in Anatomy in December, 1980, applied for the post of Assistant Professor (Anatomy)in response to advertisement issued by the Punjab Public Service Commission. The applications for this post were to be submitted by December 28, 1981. The qualifications prescribed for the candidates were as follows :

(2.) AS per the allegations in the petition the petitioner who fulfilled the above noted qualifications, submitted her application within time. As the Public Service Commission found that the petitioner had not submitted any certificate showing her experience and was thus reluctant to interview the petitioner, she submitted two certificates, Annexures P. 1 and 2. from the Professor and Head of the Department of Anatomy showing that while holding the post of Demonstrator in Anatomy from January 18, 1978 to December 31, 1978; then from January 1, 1979 to July 3, 1981 and later as Lecturer in Anatomy w. e. f. July 4, 1981 to the date of the issuance of the certificate, i. e. , July 20, 1981, she had been doing the teaching work. On this the Commission called her for interview subject to the following condition : You have been called provisionally on the condition that you will prove that you possess the requisite experience otherwise you would be considered ineligible. Your eligibility will be decided in consultation with the expert. According to the petitioner the Commission later, in consultation with the expert from the Medical and Health Department of the Punjab Government found her to be eligible on the basis of the above two certificates. In spite of this the Governmental authorities somehow found it difficult to issue the requisite "no Objection Certificate" in the case of the petitioner in view of the instructions of the Government dated February. 27, 1979. The relevant part of these instructions reads as follows; 2. The matter regarding grant of teaching experience to the PCMS II Officers working as Medical Officers against the posts of Registrar / Demonstrators had been under consideration of the Government for some time past and it has been now decided that such PCMS II officer who while working as medical officers in the basic and the unpopular clinical departments the services of which are treated as rural service against the posts of Registrars/demonstrators in a particular department of the Medical College have already registered themeselves for the M. D. / M. S. courses or have acquired such qualifications as a result of such posting in that department should be given the benefit of the teaching experience in that subject/department by treating their period of such posting as Registrars/demonstrators as the case may be. The matter may please be brought to the notice of all concerned medical officers. The departments are specified below: (i) Basic Departments, Physiology, Anatomy, Pharmocology, Pathology, Microbiology, Biochemistry (Blood transfusion ). The precise defence of the Government as disclosed in the affidavit of Mr. B. R. Kak-kar, Deputy Secretary, is as follows: The petitioner worked as Medical Officer against the post of Anatomy from 18-1-78 to 31-12-1978 but this period cannot be counted towards teaching experience because according to the Government instructions at Annexure P/4, benefit of teaching experience is to be given only to those Medical Officers who were posted against the posts of Registrar/demonstrator and had already registered themselves for MD/ms course or had acquired such qualifications as a result of such posting in that Department, by treating their such period as of Registrar/demonstrator, as the case may be. The petitioner's case does not fall in those instructions as during her posting as Medical Officer who was not registered for MD/ms. In spite of this the Department, however, forwarded the application of the petitioner to respondent No. 3, the Commission, on the condition that she fulfilled her teaching experience of three years on December ? 1, 1981, i. e. , three days after the date by which the applications were required to be submitted to the Commission. On account of the absence of this certificate, the result of the petitioner's interview has been withheld by the Commission. It is this action of the respondent authorities that is, the Government and the Commission that has necessitated the filing of this petition to seek a direction to respondent No. 2, the Director of Medical Education and Research, Government of Punjab to issue the requisite "no Objection Certificate" and the Commission, respondent No. 3, to declare her result.

(3.) MR. Kuldip Singh, Bar-at-law, learned Counsel for the petitioner, urges that the above noted action of the respondent authorities is wholly unsustainable on the following grounds: