VIBHA SHARMA Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) I have heard the learned counsel for the parties at length and have perused the record of the case.

(2.) The petitioner and respondent No. 3 came to be selected as Lecturers in Pharmacy by the Punjab Public Service Commission in the year 1993. The petitioner joined on 12.08.1994. Respondent No. 3 ranked junior to the petitioner in the selection. He also belongs to the category of Scheduled Caste. The next promotion in the hierarchy of the service from the post of Lecturer is to the post of Senior Lecturer (Pharmacy) which is a non- engineering cadre post. The State Government prescribed the qualifications for the post of Senior Lecturer (Pharmacy) vide letter dated 10.07.1991, which inter alia require second class Master's Degree in Science, Humanities in the concerned subject and five years professional or teaching experience after acquiring the minimum qualification out of which two years experience must be in teaching not below the rank of Lecturer in a Polytechnic. All the vacancies were to be filled up by promotion and if no suitable candidate is available, the post could be filled up by direct recruitment. As many as four post of Senior Lecturers were lying vacant. One Piara Singh, who was the senior most Lecturer was promoted as Senior Lecturer in the month of January, 1995. On the basis of the roster point, second vacancy was to go to the Scheduled Caste. Since no suitable Scheduled Candidate was available, Gurpreet Kaur was promoted as Senior Lecturer by de-reserving the vacancy in July, 1996. One Sarabmohan Singh was directly recruited as Senior Lecturer in December, 1994 and one post of Senior Lecturer remained vacant. All the three Senior Lecturer named above, were promoted as Heads of the Department in different disciplines which is the next promotional post after Senior Lecturer. Thus, all four posts of Senior Lecturer became vacant. On account of the seniority dispute between the Lecturers, the posts of Senior Lecturers could not be filled up quite some time. In the year 2001, recruitment rules were framed, known as Government of Punjab, Department of Technical Education and Industrial Training (Technical Education Wing), Group-A, Service Rules, 2001. Under these rules, 75% posts of the Senior Lecturers were to be filled up by promotion whereas 25% posts of Senior Lecturers were to be filled up by way of direct recruitment meaning thereby that out of three posts of Senior Lecturers were to be filled up by promotion whereas one post of Senior Lecturer was to be filled up by direct recruitment.

(3.) A seniority list of Lecturers was circulated by the State Government vide letter dated 23.11.2001. In the said seniority list, the first nine names, including the petitioner and respondent No. 3 are as under: