STATE OF HARYANA Vs. BRIJ MOHAN MAHARISHI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this judgment I will dispose of two Regular Second Appeals No. 65 of 1989 State of Haryana v. Brij Mohan Maharishi, and No. 2739 of 1988 Brij Mohan Maharishi v. State of Haryana and others, as both these cross appeals have arisen from one judgment and decree dated 15.9.1988 passed by the Court of Additional District Judge, Narnaul, who partly allowed the appeal filed by Brij Mohan Maharishi and gave directions to the State of Haryana that the case regarding the grant of selection grade to the plaintiff would be considered and the selection grade would be released to him within the three months from the date of the passing of the judgment, in accordance with the rules. Besides that Civil Writ Petition No. 3272 of 1989 titled Smt. Vidya Wati v. State of Haryana and others, is being disposed of in terms of the order dated 15.3.1989 passed by the Division Bench of this Court.

(2.) Firstly, in the pleadings of the suit for declaration which was filed by Brij Mohan Maharishi, it was pleaded by him that he was appointed as untrained teacher in D.B. Primary School, Paterewala, District Ferozepur, under the control of the District Board on 11.1.1957 in the Punjab State. He did matriculation in the year 1953. The District Board Schools were taken over by the State of Punjab and the teachers were categorised as provincialised cadre. Such taking over was concluded on 10.10.1957. The plaintiff claims to have completed his in service courses from Basic Training Institute, Faridkot, on 2.9.1959 and 9.9.1959 and in this way he claims himself to have qualified for all the benefits of service and others facilities. It has been pleaded by him that there was a scheme of Award of Special Certificate, which was discontinued all of a sudden, but since the untrained teachers were hit hard by the such decision of the Education Department, so in order to safeguard the interests of such teachers a scheme of in-service training courses was evolved and a provision was made for the grant of special certificate and such certificate was to be granted to a teacher on his completion of five years of service and according to paragraph 6 of the plaint the plaintiff became entitled to special certificate with effect from 1961-62. The case of the plaintiff is that no such certificate was granted to him and he moved many applications and made a number of representations for grant of such certificate and consequently for the grant of selection grade, but to no effect. It is alleged by the plaintiff, the B.E.O., Bawal, also recommended his case to S.D.E.O., Rewari, vide letter dated 7.7.1978 and that letter was further transmitted to the higher authorities, but no such certificate was granted to him. The plaintiff gave notice under Section 80 C.P.C. on 27.9.1973, but to no effect. Hence he filed a suit for declaration that withholding of special certificate and consequent selection grade to him was illegal, void, arbitrary, without jurisdiction and against service rules.

(3.) The defendants filed written statement and contested the suit. They took preliminary objection that the suit was not maintainable on account of inordinate delay and laches; that it was bad for non-joinder of necessary parties; that the Civil Court had no jurisdiction to try the suit. On merits it was pleaded that though the plaintiff completed in-service training course from 1.6.1959 to 15.7.1959 and 27.7.1960 to 9.9.1960, but he did not fulfil the requirements of Article 153 of the Haryana Education Code, and thus he was not entitled to any special certificate. Relevant part of Article 153 has been reproduced in paragraph 6 of the written statement. It was further pleaded that the plaintiff never applied for the grant of special certificate before 31.12.1965, which was the last date for the receipt of such representations.