ALI MOHD Vs. CHAIRMAN, T A C, UDHAMPUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This judgment will govern the disposal of a bunch of writ petitions raising identical questions of law arising in the back-ground of almost similar facts of each case.

(2.) In these eight writ petitions the case of each petitioner is, that he is a permanent employee of the Town Area Committee, Udhampur, whose service has been terminated by the respondent-the Chairman of the committee without' following the procedure laid down in Rules 32 and 35 of the Jammu and Kashmir Government Servants' (Classification, Control & Appeal) Rules, 1956, and Section 126 of the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir. This termination, he goes on to state, is by way of punishment, and its genesis is traced to the ill-will and malice which the respondent as a member of the Jana Sangha communal political Organisation, entertains against the petitioner, who by conviction is opposed to the said Organisation. On October 16,1973, adds the petitioner, a peaceful sit-in-strike was organised by the Dharat Employees Union, Udhampur, of which the petitioner is a member, and one day's casual leave which was due to him and-which. could not have been refused was applied for by him, but his service was terminated by the respondent in purported exercise of the powers vested in him under Article 128 of the Jammu and Kashmir Civil Service Regulation due to the petitioner's absence from duty on the said date, without giving him a prior notice of the proposed punishment. The case of the respondent, on the other hand, is, that the petitioner in each case is only a temporary employee, who remained absent from duty on October 16, 1973 ; his application for leave to his own knowledge having been rejected by the respondent. It has been denied that termination of service was motivated by any ill-will or malice, but barring the cases of three petitioners, namely, Mulk Raj, Shadi Lal and Harbhajan Singh, whose services have been terminated on some additional grounds as well, it has been pleaded, that the same was strictly done under article 128 of the Civil Service Regulations, without any intention to punish the petitioner. Whereas, in the case of Mulkh Raj the additional ground is his un-suitability for service, in the cases of Shadi Lal and Harbhajan Singh, it is negligent conduct in service. Lastly, it has been asserted that neither rules 32 and 35 of the Classification, Control And Appeal Rules, nor the provisions of Section 126 of the State Constitution were attracted to the facts of these cases.

(3.) It may also be pointed out that during the pendency of these writ petitions, the posts of all the petitioners were abolished, and this fact was brought to the notice of the Court by the respondent by making a separate application in each case. As transpires from the interim order dated October 19, 1974 passed in writ petition No : 236 of 1973, this fact was specifically put to Mr. Sethi representing the petitioners in all the cases, who admitted the same but at the same time contended that abolition of posts after the impugned orders were passed would be wholly inconsequential so far as the final out-Come of the petitions was concerned-