PRATIVA KUMARI Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) In this batch of ten writ petitions on behalf of 22 Petitioners in all, the dispute relates to repatriation of ESI Medical Officers to the Health Department. By common notification dated 10.10.2001 the Petitioners and others have been repatriated by the Labour, Employment and Training Department (in short, Labour (Department) to their parent department i.e. the Health Department. They seek quashing of the said notification and ancillary reliefs.

(2.) The representative facts of the case may be noticed from the record of CWJC No. 13987/2001 which has been argued as the leading case. Briefly stated, the case of the Petitioners is that they were appointed as Civil Assistant Surgeons in the Health Department by the Government of Bihar but their services were transferred permanently to the Labour Department to work in the hospitals and dispensaries under the Employees' State Insurance (ESI) Scheme. Under the provisions of the Employees State Insurance Act, 1948 the Central Government has established Employees' State Insurance Corporation for the administration of the employees insurance scheme. The ESI scheme envisages improvement of the health and welfare of the insured employees, their rehabilitation and re-employment in case of disablement or injury. The fund is provided to the Corporation by the Central Government, the State Government, the local authority or any individual or body for all or any purposes of the Act. For implementing the scheme, inter alia, hospitals and dispensaries have been established to provide medical benefits under the administrative control of the Labour Department. For this purpose Insurance Medical Officers are posted. As per requirement Civil Assistant Surgeons belonging to the Bihar Health Services are drawn from Health Department. The Petitioners were thus posted to the Labour Department.

(3.) The case of the Petitioners, in context, is that they have been repatriated to the Health Department in a discriminatory manner on pick and choose basis. Those serving the Labour Department for longer periods have been retained while those who come later have been repatriated. The criteria mentioned in the minutes of the Establishment Committee dated 29.6.2001 are a ploy to retain the favoured ones and send back those not so fortunate. The decision to repatriate the Petitioners (and others) in fact was taken beyond the terms of the agenda. Finally, without the cadre division upon bifurcation of State of Bihar under Bihar Reorganisation Act, 2000 , no repatriation could be made.