SANG SINGH Vs. MUNICIPAL BOARD POKARAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this writ petition, Mr. Shrimali, appearing for the petitioner, has raised three-fold objections to the order of termination of the petitioner, from the post of Upper Division Clerk of the Municipal Board, Pokaran. It is not disputed that the petitioner is an ex-service man being retired Company Havaldar Major in the Army. He was directly ordered to be appointed as UDC as per the Government order dated January 22, 1979. This appointment was made under Rule 27 of the Rajasthan Municipal (Subordinate and Ministerial Service) Rules, 1963 (in short, 'the Rules' hereafter) for one year from the date of the order. He joined on August 3, 1979. It is on record that the Assistant Regional Director extended his services for one year by Ex. 4, dated July 9, 1980. The Administrator of the Municipal Board has terminated the services of the petitioner.

(2.) ON the above undisputed facts, Mr. Shrimali has submitted that firstly, extension having been granted by the Director, the Administrator could not have terminated the services of the petitioner. It was also argued that in any case, the petitioner is a workman and the provisions of Industrial Disputes Act apply and, therefore, his termination amounts to retrenchment and the conditions of retrenchment having not been fulfilled, the termination is bad in law. Mr. Shrimali relied upon the judgements of the Supreme Court reported in State of Assam vs. Raghava Rajgopalachari (11), D. N. Banerji vs. P. R. Kukherjee (2), Bhopal Sugar Industries vs. Income-tax Officer (3) and State Bank of India vs. Shri R. Sundara Money (4) in support of the above propositions.

(3.) CONFRONTED with the above, Mr. Shrimali argued that the Administrator cannot be allowed to challenge the order of the Director and furthermore, since he himself appointed the petitioner earlier, he cannot be allowed to turn around and point out some infirmities in it by taking a somersault. This proposition as enumerated by Mr. Shrimali may be correct depending upon the facts and circumstances of each case.