PAWAN KUMAR Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this common judgment, I shall dispose of CWP Nos.19532 19539, 19541, 22532 and 23553 of 2013. Pawan Kumar, retired Branch Manager, Nand Lal retired Senior Clerk, Sukhminder Singh retired Branch Manager, Nirmala Devi wife of deceased Surinder Pal ex -Daftri and Urmila Devi retired Assistant Accountant of the Mandi Gobindgarh Cooperative House Building Society Limited, Mandi Gobindgarh (for short, 'the Society) have filed these writ petitions.

(2.) The facts of the case are extracted from CWP No.19532 of 2013 filed by Pawan Kumar. It is stated that the Society is registered under the Punjab Cooperative Societies Act, 1961 (in short, 'the Act') and governed by the provisions of the Punjab Cooperative Societies Rules, 1963 (in short, 'the Rules) and the by -laws framed there under. There are approximately 5500 members of the Society and there have been 14 -15 employees in the Society. There are no statutory rules governing the service conditions of the employees of the Society. As the Society has no subscribed capital share of the government, hence it is not mandatory for the Society to adopt statutory service rules of Housefed which governs the service conditions of the employees of Punjab State Federation of Cooperative House Building Societies Limited (Housefed). The service conditions of the employees of the Housefed have been framed under Section 85 of the Act read with Rule 28 of the Rules. In fact under Section 84 -A of the Act, the Common Cadre Rules of several apex Socities have been framed. While making reference to Rule 28 of the Rules and Section 84 -A of the Act, it was pleaded that Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Punjab has framed the service rules of various class of Cooperative Societies for example (1) the Punjab Cooperative Agricultural Services Societies, Service Rules, 1997 for the employees of Cooperative Agricultural Service Society (2) Punjab Cooperative Marketing Societies Service Rules for employees of Marketing Societies (3) The Markfed Common Cadre Rules, 1990 for employees of Markfed (4) The Punjab Cooperative Financing Institution Service Rules, 1971 for employees of Central Cooperative Banks etc. By -laws 36 is the only clause which contains the provisions governing the service conditions of the employees of the Society, which is reproduced as under: -

(3.) To provide security of service to the employees of the Society, the draft service rules of the Society were prepared in the year 1998 and sent to the Registrar for approval containing the provisions regarding Mode of appointment, service conditions, pay scale, disciplinary action etc. (Annexure P1). Despite several reminders by the Managing Committee, Registrar did not pass any order on the said approval, whereas under Rule 28 of the Rules and Section 84(A) of the Act, the rules are to be framed by the Registrar. Therefore, the employees of the Society filed CWP No.1953 of 2005 seeking direction to the official respondents to take a decision on the service rules. Vide order dated 4.4.2005, respondent No.2 rejected the the proposed draft rules submitted by the Society. It is also claimed by the petitioner that the Society is running in profit for the years from 2009 -2010 to 2012 -2013. Vide resolution dated 10.2.1998, in the draft service rules, the age of retirement was fixed at 60 years. There are previous communications by respondent No.2 Registrar where the previous employees of the Cooperative Societies have been allowed to work upto the age of 65 years. A copy of the one such letter dated 2.12.1970, issued by respondent No.2 Registrar is Annexure P4. There are 15 employees in the service of the Society as on 31.3.2010 (Annexure P5). The employees filed a petition before respondent No.2 Registrar Cooperative Societies for fixing the retirement age. Consequently, vide order dated 13.7.2010, the Registrar directed the Joint Registrar, Cooperative Societies, Patiala to decide the representation of the petitioners as per law.