DHANPAT SINGH Vs. STATE OF HARYANA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Petitioner was selected and appointed as a Forest Guard in the Forest Department, Haryana on 13.9.1976 on regular basis. He was thereafter confirmed on the post of Forest Guard on 14.9.1979. One Naib Singh, Forest Guard, who was junior to the petitioner in service was promoted to the post of Forester with effect from 1.9.1981 without considering the claim of the petitioner for promotion to the said post. The petitioner challenged the action of the respondents in promoting Naib Singh as Forester, by filing an appeal before respondent No. 1 in July 1993 i.e. after a period of about twelve years of the promotion of Naib Singh as Forester. Appeal filed by the petitioner was accepted and consequently he came to be promoted as Forester with retrospective effect i.e. 1.9.1981, by order dated 10.6.1996, Annexure P-2. The promotion of the petitioner as Forester was ordered subject to certain conditions as contained in the promotion order Annexure P-2 and one of the conditions mentioned in the order was that the petitioner will not be given the arrears of salary for the back period, but he will be entitled to his seniority and his pay will be determined notionally. It was further mentioned that the petitioner will be given the pay as Forester from the date of issuance of the order i.e. 10.6.1996. It is this latter part of the promotion order, Annexure P-2 which has been challenged herein by the petitioner in this writ petition under Articles 226/227 of the Constitution of India.

(2.) Learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that once the petitioner was held entitled to promotion as Forester with retrospective effect i.e. from the due date 1.9.1981, he could not be denied the back wages for the period 1.9.1981 till the date of his promotion order especially when his claim for promotion as such was found to be genuine and he was found eligible for being considered for promotion as Forester and was granted other benefits. The contention of the learned counsel in other words is that the petitioner having been denied promotion illegally, at the time when a person junior to him was promoted as Forester, he is entitled to the grant of arrears of salary for the past period as well.

(3.) We have considered the submission and find that the same is without merit. Naib Singh, Forest Guard admittedly, a person junior to the petitioner was promoted as Forester in the year 1981, but the petitioner did not raise a finger against the promotion of Naib Singh for a period of about twelve years and he made his grouse against that action for the first time in July 1993. Since the petitioner did not challenge the promotion of the person junior to him for a period of about twelve years and he represented against that by filing appeal only in July 1993, he in our opinion is not entitled to the salary for the period prior to the date of issuance of order of his promotion as Forester. Moreover, the promotion order Annexure P-2 records that the petitioner passed the forest course only in the year 1995-96 and during the course of hearing, it was conceded that passing of the said forest course was a condition precedent for promotion to the post of Forester. In that view of the matter as well, the petitioner is certainly not entitled to the arrears of salary for the period prior to the date of issuance of the order of his promotion. The judgment relied upon by learned counsel for the petitioner reported as Zile Singh v. The Haryana State Agricultural Marketing Board and others, 1998 1 SCT 390(P&H) has no application to the facts and circumstances of this case. In the reported case, the petitioner could not work on the higher post because of the orders passed by the Court and it was in that situation that arrears of pay were ordered to be paid to him. Such is not the situation in the present case.