SATWANTI ARYA Vs. STATE OF HARYANA AND ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Feeling aggrieved against the order dated 22.4.1999 (Annexure P-12), whereby regular pay scale for the post of Sanskrit teacher was denied to the petitioner, with effect from the date petitioner acquired the qualification of B.Ed., petitioner has approached this court by way of present writ petition. Notice of motion was issued and pursuant thereto, written statement was filed on behalf of the respondents.

(2.) Learned Senior counsel for the petitioner submits that the petitioner was appointed as Sanskrit teacher on regular basis by respondent No. 4, after following the due procedure, but as an untrained teacher. Petitioner was granted fixed salary. While serving with respondent No. 4, petitioner acquired the qualification of B.Ed. as well, with effect from 25.7.1973. Petitioner was already M.A. Sanskrit. Learned Senior counsel for the petitioner further submits that after acquiring the qualification of M.A. Sanskrit and B.Ed., with effect from 25.7.1973, petitioner had become fully eligible for the post of Sanskrit teacher and she was entitled for the regular pay scale with effect from 25.7.1973. When respondent No. 4 recommended the case of the petitioner to the higher authorities, respondent No. 2 issued the communication dated 10.6.1981, whereby appointment of the petitioner as Sanskrit teacher was regularised with effect from 28.7.1980, granting her regular pay scale. However, question of granting regular pay scale from the back date i.e. 25.7.1973 was kept under consideration and it was intimated that appropriate action will be intimated later on. But, respondent No. 2, after keeping the matter pending for long 18 years, issued the impugned order dated 22.4.1999, which was non-speaking and cryptic on the face of it. Learned Senior counsel for the petitioner would next contend that since the qualification of M.A. Sanskrit and B.Ed. was higher than the minimum required qualification of Shastri and O.T., petitioner was very much competent and entitled for the regular pay scale of the post of Sanskrit teacher right from 25.7.1973. Since this aspect of the matter has neither been discussed nor discarded, but altogether ignored by respondent No. 2, while passing the impugned communication dated 22.4.1999 (Annexure P-2), the same was not sustainable in law. Relying upon two judgments of this court in Veena Jain v. State of Haryana, 1998 1 SCT 41 and a Division Bench judgment dated 21.12.2007 in CWP No. 10926 of 2007 (Ashok Kumar and others v. State of Haryana and others), he prays for allowing the present writ petition, by setting aside the impugned order.

(3.) Faced with the abovesaid fact situation pointed out by learned Senior counsel for the petitioner, learned counsel for the State could not deny the correctness thereof and rightly so, because it was a matter of record. Despite his efforts, learned counsel for the State could not distinguish the present case from the reported judgments of this court in Veena Jain's case as well as in Ashok Kumar's case . However, he prays for dismissal of the writ petition.