Central Administrative Tribunal - Jaipur
R P Jain vs M/O Personnel,Public Grievances And ... on 18 April, 2023
OA No.386/2014
(1)
Central Administrative Tribunal
Jaipur Bench, Jaipur
O.A.No.386/2014
Reserved on: 12.04.2023
Pronounced on: 18.04.2023
Hon'ble Mr. Dinesh Sharma, Member (A)
Hon'ble Mrs. Hina P. Shah, Member (J)
R.P. Jain, S/o Shri M.L. Jain, aged about 61 years, R/o
19-B, Rajendra Marg, Bapu Nagar, Jaipur.
...Applicant.
(By Advocate: Shri Amit Mathur)
Versus
1. Union of India, represented through Secretary,
Department of Personnel and Training [DOPT],
Ministry of Personnel, North Block, New Delhi.
2. State of Rajasthan, Represented through
Secretary, Department of Personnel [DOP],
Government Secretariat, Jaipur.
...Respondents.
(By Advocate: Shri Rajendra Vaish for R-1 and
Shri V.D.Sharma for R-2)
ORDER
Per: Dinesh Sharma, Member (A):
The applicant has prayed for the following reliefs in this OA:
"1. The present application filed by the Applicant may kindly be allowed and that the Respondent State may be directed to produce the entire record related to promotion in the fixed pay of the member of IAS from year 1977 OA No.386/2014 (2) Batch onwards till 1981 Batch of IAS Rajasthan Cadre. On the basis of the pleadings and the record the Respondent State may be directed to consider the name of the Applicant for promotion in the Fixed Pay of Rs.80,000/- against the vacancies of the year 2012 and he may be directed to be promoted against the vacancies of the year 2012 and to give all consequential benefit of pay and pension to the applicant.
(iv) Any other order or direction which this Hon'ble Tribunal may deem fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the case may also be passed in favor of the applicant."
2. The claim of the applicant, very briefly summarized, is that he should have been considered for promotion to the Chief Secretary's Grade (Rs.80,000 fixed) by the meeting of the screening committee held on 30.12.2012 (minutes annexed at Annexure A/I) which cleared the names of 7 officers of his Batch (1980) for promotion to that grade. The applicant retired on 31.07.2012. According to him, following the instructions relating to promotion to this scale, the committee meeting should have been held earlier, and since it was held later, his name should have been considered even after his retirement, as per Para 8.1 (b) of the instructions. The applicant has OA No.386/2014 (3) alleged that in other States there have been promotions to this level, of entire batches junior to that of the applicants, and in the State of Rajasthan also, following the meeting of the screening committee with respect to the Batch of 1981, held on 01.11.2013, the Government had promoted an officer of the 1981 Batch (Dr. Dinesh Kumar Goyal), retiring in the same year (31.12.2013). The applicant has stated that the number of vacancies has never been a constraint for promotions and the same is evident from the minutes of the screening committees annexed with the OA.
3. A reply has been filed by Respondent No.2 denying the claim made by the applicant. It is stated that the OA is barred by period of limitation given in the Administrative Tribunals Act. Quoting the same instructions (Annexed at Annexure A/III.), the reply states that the applicant was not considered for promotion (while considering his batch for promotions in the year 2012) since he had retired on 31.07.2012. There have been regular meetings of the concerned screening committees every year. The promotion of Dr. Dinesh Kumar Goyal, happened in the year 2013, following the screening committee meeting held on OA No.386/2014 (4) 01.11.2013, as he was a member of the service at that time.
4. The applicant filed a rejoinder giving reasons for the delay. Besides reiterating the claims made in the OA, it is stated that there is no bar against consideration of retired officers. Though the applicant became eligible for consideration for grant of this Apex Grade on completion of 30 years of service in the year 2010, his name was not even considered in any of the meetings held after that year and hence this OA.
5. The matter was finally heard on 12.04.2023. Both the learned counsels (of the applicant and the Respondent No.2) repeated the arguments mentioned in their respective pleadings. The learned counsel for the applicant reminded us about the fact that we had already condoned the delay in filing this OA, by order dated 01.08.2018, on his Miscellaneous Application No.325/2014.
6. After going through the pleadings and hearing the arguments, we find that the claim of the applicant is mainly based on Section Headings 2 and 3 of the Annexure II attached with GOI instructions, dated OA No.386/2014 (5) 28.03.2000 (Annexure A/III of the OA). These are instructions relating to the frequency and conduct of meetings for promotion to the Chief Secretary's Grade. We are reproducing these two in full here:
"2. Frequency at which committees should meet.
Meetings of the Committees should be convened at regular intervals to draw panels for filling up vacancies arising during the course of a year. For this purpose, it is essential for the concerned State Government to initiate action to fill up the existing as well as anticipated vacancies well in advance of the expiry of the previous panel by collecting relevant documents like ACRs, integrity certificates, seniority list etc. for placing before the Committees. Meeting of the Committees may be convened every year on a predetermined date e.g. 1st of May or June. All the cadres should lay down a time schedule for holding the Committee meetings and the Secretary- in-charge of the Personnel Department of the State Government shall ensure that they are held regularly. Holding of these meetings should not be delayed or postponed on the one or the other administrative ground or on the ground that the necessary material for placement before the Committees is not ready. The requirement of convening regular meetings of the Committee can be dispensed with only after a certificate has been issued by the Secretary-in- charge of the Personnel Deptt. to the effect that there are no vacancies to be filled by promotion or no officers are OA No.386/2014 (6) due for promotion/confirmation during the year in question.
3. Determination of vacancies It is essential that the number of vacancies in respect of which a panel is to be prepared should be estimated as accurately as possible. For this purpose, the vacancies to be taken into account should be clear vacancies arising in a grade due to death, retirement, resignation, promotions and deputation. As regards vacancies arising due to deputation, only those cases of deputation for periods exceeding one year should be taken into account, taking due note of the number of deputationists likely to return to the cadre. Purely short term vacancies arising as a result of the officers proceeding on leave, training or on deputation for a short term period or as a result of over utilization of the sanctioned State Deputation Reserve not approved by the Central Government, should not be taken into account for the purpose of preparation of a panel. In cases where there has been delay in holding the Committee meetings for a year or more, vacancies should be indicated year-wise separately, by also including the names of officers in the zone of consideration who would have been eligible and available for consideration had the meeting(s) of the DPC taken place in time but have since retired or expired.
7. Emphasizing the last sentence of these instructions, the learned counsel for the applicant OA No.386/2014 (7) argued that there is no bar against consideration of retired persons. According to him, there is a clear mandate for including all such persons, whether serving or retired, who have completed 30 years of service, while considering promotion to the Apex Grade, in meetings held every year after an officer attains the eligibility for such consideration. Countering this, the learned counsel for the Respondent No.2 brought our attention to the specific relief prayed by the applicant where he has specifically asked for consideration against the vacancies of the year 2012. The State has been conducting regular meetings of the screening committee every year. There is not even a claim by the applicant that he should have been considered before other persons of his Batch (1980) were considered (in the year 2012). Since the applicant retired on 31.07.2012, much before the date (30.12.2012) on which the meeting to fill the vacancies of the year 2012 was held, there was no need to consider him for granting the Chief Secretary's Grade, as he was no longer in service.
8. We have carefully gone through the related instructions including those reproduced above. It is very clear from the last sentence of Section 3 OA No.386/2014 (8) (reproduced above) that it indicates (or mandates) inclusion of retired officers also "in cases where there has been delay in holding the Committee meetings for a year or more, vacancies should be indicated year- wise separately, by also including the names of officers in the zone of consideration who would have been eligible and available for consideration had the meeting(s) of the DPC taken place in time." In the case before us, the applicant has stated, (in Para 4 (8) of the OA) that the vacancies should have been calculated before 01.12.2012 and the meeting of the committee should have been convened before the above date". It is obviously an error and the applicant perhaps wants to say that it should have been convened before 31.12.2011. In another paragraph (Paragraph 4 (3) of the OA), he states that "the meeting of the screening committee which was convened on 30.12.2013 for preparing a panel for promotion in the grade of Chief Secretary". The same date is shown in the synopsis. These dates are also obviously wrong, since the Annexure A/1 clearly shows the date of the meeting as 30.12.2012. Even if we ignore all these errors, it is clear that there has not been a delay of one year or more in the conduct of meeting for the year 2012 (even if accept the intended OA No.386/2014 (9) contention of the applicant that the meeting should have been conducted before the beginning of the year 2012).
9. After reading all the relevant instructions, we have no doubt in our mind that the respondents have conducted regular meetings as per the instructions of the GOI contained in Annexure A/III). Since the applicant has not even prayed for considering him before 2012, and since no one from his batch (let alone juniors) were considered for promotion to this rank before 2012, we do not think there is any need to go into whether his name was kept in the zone of consideration in the meetings held in the years before that. The applicant retired in the middle of the year 2012. It is true that if the screening committee for the year 2012 was held any time before his date of retirement (31.07.2012), his name could have been considered for grant of Chief Secretary's Grade (as happened in the case of Dr. Dinesh Kumar Goyal next year, who happened to retire on the last date of that year (31.12.2013) and the meeting was held in the month of November that year).OA No.386/2014
(10)
10. The applicant has not shown us any rule, applicable to All India Services, mandating the conduct of meeting before the start of the relevant year. The rules, quoted reproduced above, specifically mention conduct of meeting regularly every year. These rules indicate consideration of retired officers only if there is a delay of more one year or more in the conduct of screening committee meetings. There is not even an allegation that there was such a delay in the conduct of screening committee meeting and we find that the meetings, to screen candidates for grant of Chief Secretary's Grade, have been conducted in the State very regularly every year. Therefore, we do not find anything illegal or irregular, in not considering the name of the applicant, for grant of Chief Secretary's Grade, in a meeting conducted for the relevant year, at a time when he was no longer in service.
11. The learned counsel for the applicant has produced written arguments in support of the applicant's claim, after the case was reserved for judgment. These cases are listed below: OA No.386/2014 (11)
i) B.P.Gairola vs. Union of India & Others decided by the Principal Bench of this Tribunal on 14.05.2013 in OA No.2853/2012.
ii) N.Rajam & Others vs. Union of India & Others decided by the Hon'ble Ernakulam High Court on 12.02.2019 in OP (CAT) No.24 of 2019.
iii) S.B Bhattacharjee vs. S.D.Majumdar and Others (2007) 10 SCC 513.
12. We have perused all of these cases and do not find these to be applicable on the facts of the present case. These cases are applicable when there has been delay in conduct of regular meetings, which is not the matter in the present case. The present case is also not a case of wrongly given notional promotion to juniors (B.P Gairola decision of the Principal Bench of this Tribunal). The Ernakulam High Court decision (N.Rajam & Others vs. Union of India & Others) relates to a matter where the DPC had considered the retired persons for selection and found them fit but not given promotion only since they had retired. This, too, is not the present case. The decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court (in S.B Bhattacharjee case.) has been given highlighting the paragraph 13 of this judgment where the Hon'ble Supreme Court has mentioned about the fundamental right of a person to be considered for OA No.386/2014 (12) promotion. We cannot fail to read the remaining portion of this paragraph where the Hon'ble Supreme Court has qualified their observation with "the terms and conditions of service of an employee including his right to be considered for promotion indisputably are governed by the rules framed under the proviso appended to Article 309 of the Constitution of India". Since we do not find any violation of any rules governing the promotion of IAS officers to the Apex Scale (Chief Secretary's Scale), we do not think there is any violation, in the present case, of the dictum of the Hon'ble Supreme Court.
13. For all these reasons, the OA is dismissed without any orders regarding costs.
(Hina P. Shah) (Dinesh Sharma) Member (J) Member (A) /kdr/