PUNJAB STATE ELECTRICITY BOARD Vs. SANT RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By this judgment, I shall dispose of the above captioned three regular second appeals as common question of law and facts arise in all of them.

(2.) The brief facts of the case are that all the plaintiffs-respondents were appointed as Lower Division Clerks (LDC) on ad hoc basis initially for a period of three months. However, their services without any break continued. In RSA No. 633 of 1997, Sant Ram plaintiff-respondent was appointed as LDC vide appointment letter memo No. 17281 dated 30.7.1976 (Ex. D1) and he joined his duties on 6.8.1976 while Surinder Kumar plaintiff-respondent in RSA No. 299 of 1997 was appointed as LDC vide appointment letter memo No. 858 dated 3.8.1976 (Ex. D3) and he joined as such on 10.8.1976. Both of them were regularized with effect from 1.4.1978. Krishan Lal plaintiff-respondent in RSA No. 426 of 1997 was appointed vide memo No. 10162/EA-3421 dated 20.4.1977 (Ex. P6/A) and joined his duties as LDC on 27.4.1977 and his services were regularized with effect from 26.12.1980. They were given seniority from the date when they were regularized in service. All of them are claiming seniority on the following ground :-

(3.) All these facts have been admitted by the defendants-appellants. However, they disputed the seniority from the date of joining solely on the ground that the plaintiffs-respondents were appointed initially on ad hoc basis and ad hoc services cannot be considered for promotion. The defendants-appellants also raised the question of limitation in filing the suit.