OM PRAKASH SAH Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The challenge in the above writ petition is to Rule 16 of the Bihar Excise Constables Cadre (Recruitment And Service-Condition) Rules 2014 (hereinafter referred to as the 'Rules of 2014'). By Rule 16 of the rules, the inter se seniority of directly recruited candidates are fixed in such a manner as to enable the Home Guards of Bihar and Ex-Army Men, who have been set apart 25% vacancies each, to be seniors in the cadre of Excise Constables appointed in a calendar year. The claim of the petitioners, who are directly recruited candidates in the 50% vacancies considered for direct recruitment from the eligible candidates is that the such classification visits them with hostile discrimination and there is no intelligible differentia with the object sought to be achieved.

(2.) The learned counsel for the petitioners argued for the position that the directly recruited candidates across the board, dehors such classification, has to be granted seniority in accordance with the merit in the selection process. The petitioners' counsel also points out that in the cadre of Warder of Prisons of the State wherein also there is a direct recruitment from candidates of the general public and 25% vacancies each, set apart for Home Guards and Ex-Army Men, where there is no such seniority conferred on either of the two categories. The Bihar Warder Cadre Rules, 2014, again projects the hardship occasioned insofar as those recruited to the Cadre of Excise Guards, the classification in which is violative of the principles enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution of India.

(3.) The learned counsel for the petitioners to buttress his arguments relied on Deepak Sibal v. Punjab University; (1989) 2 SCC 145, Aashirwad Films v. Union of India; (2007) 6 SCC 624 and Union of India v. N.S. Rathnam; (2015) 10 SCC 681.