BIRENDRA KUMAR SINGH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE dispute in this writ petition relates to promotion to the post of Assistant Director/ District Publication Relation Officer in the Department of Information and Public Relation, Government of Bihar. The petitioner had approached this Court in respect of his claim for such promotion in CWJC No. 3893/96. Pursuant to the order passed therein he filed representation which has been rejected by the order contained in Annexure -1 on 24.2.99. He seeks quashing of the said order and direction to reconsider his case.

(2.) THE case of the petitioner is as follows. The petitioner was appointed as Assistant Public Relation Officer (APRO), a Class III Non -gazetted post in the Department of information and Public Relation on 2.10.73. On 13.10.73 he joined the post. One Bishwanath Singh, a Receptionist in the cadre of Clerk, was promoted to the post of APRO on 5.8.75. The gradation list of APROs was published on 22.1.79 in which the petitioner was placed at serial no. 12 while the said Bishwanath Singh was placed at serial no. 20. On 11.7.82 the Departmental Promotion Committee considered the cases of APROs for promotion on the post of Additional District Public Relation Officer (DPRO), a gazetted Class III post. The case of the petitioner was considered and he was promoted to the post of Additional District Public Relation Officer on 5.10.82. Earlier on 22.9.82 he had been given additional charge of the post of District Public Relation Officer, the basic grade Class 2 gazetted post in the Bihar Information Service. In the gradation list of Additional District Public Relations Officers published on 15.10.85 the petitioner was placed at serial no. 48. The name of said Bishwanath Singh did not figure in the list. However on 24.10.86 he was promoted to the post of Additional District Public Relation Officer with retrospective effect from 14.9.79. Despite his promotion with effect from 14.9.79. Bishwanath Singh was placed below the petitioner at serial no. 11 (petitioner was placed at serial no. 4) in the final gradation list which was published on 20.11.87. On 2.6.89, 20 persons were promoted to the post of Assistant Director/ DRPO including 15. from the cadre of Additional District Public Relation Officer and 5 from the other cadres in the Department of Information and Public Relation. Out of said 15 promotees from the cadre of Additional District Public Relation Officer, 5 were junior to the petitioner including the said Bishwanath Singh. On 8.6.89 the petitioner filed representation objecting to the aforesaid promotion to the juniors including the said Bishwanath Singh bypassing his claim. Nothing happened on the representation, meanwhile between 1989 and 1996 several promotions were given to the post of Assstant Director/ DPRO from the different cadre posts such as Photographer. The petitioner in the circumstances came to this Court in CWJC No. 3893/96 on 29.3.96. By order dated 2.12.97 the writ petition was disposed of with a direction to the petitioner to file representation before the Secretary, Department of Information and Public Relation, with a corresponding direction to him to dispose of the same within three months. By the impugned order dated 24.2.99 the claim of the petitioner has been rejected.

(3.) TWO counter affidavits, one of them described as supplementary counter affidavit, has been filed on behalf of the respondents. Before adverting to the contents of the affidavits it is worth pointing out that both the affidavits have been sworn on the same day, viz 4.5.2001. and by the same officer Sri Ganesh Choudhary, Under Secretary, Information and Public Relation Department. Considering that both the affidavits were prepared at about the same time, in the normal course if any thing was missing in the first affidavit, the averment should have been incorporated in that very affidavit instead of filing another affidavit along with the first one. Filing of affidavit by the department involves expenditure and therefore unless circumstances so require affidavits should not be casually filed with incomplete facts. As in the instant case two affidavits were filed on the same day it appears proper to observe that the circumstances in which they were filed may be enquired into by the Secretary and if adequate explanation is not furnished by the persons concerned, suitable action may be taken.