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04. Shri Raghvendra Kumar, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner took us to the provisions of the Maternity Benefit Act of 1961, the provisions of Section 27 thereof and argued that in view of the aforesaid provision merely because of the stipulation contained in Clause 10 of the contract of appointment the benefit of the Act of 1961 cannot be denied to the petitioner. He thereafter, invited our attention to Clause 7 of the contract of appointment and argued that even to a contract employee the provisions of the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services Conduct Rules, 1965, the Disciplinary and Appeal Rules, 1966 and the General Conditions of Service Rules are made applicable. Only the leave rules are not made applicable but by a notification issued by the State Government on 29.02.1996 vide Annexure P/10 the State Government has notified that a temporary or a casual employee working in the State Government has also been entitled to all the leave rules as applicable to the regular employee working in the cadre of the State Government.

07. He submits that creation of a new contract of employment when one of the parties to the contract namely the respondents are not willing is not permissible under law. He also invites our attention to various statutory rules applicable in the State of Madhya Pradesh and argues that these rules particularly the leave rules are applicable only to regular employees who fall within the definition of "civil servants" and not to a daily wages, a casual employee or a contract employee like the present petitioner.

15. We find that vide notification (Annexure P/10) dated 29.02.1996, the State Government has made all the leave rules applicable to a regular employee of the State Government, applicable to casual employees and temporary employees working in the State of Madhya Pradesh, it that be so, we are of the considered view that the petitioner would be entitled to maternity leave at par with a regular employee working in the establishment of the respondents or in any other establishment of the State Government and in rejecting the claim of the petitioner on account of the fact that she was only a contract employee an error has been committed by the respondents which has to be remedied by us in this petition.

16. Identical issue of granting maternity leave to women employees appointed on contract basis or on adhoc or temporary basis have been considered by the Allahabad High Court, the Rajasthan High Court, the Punjab & Haryana High Court and the Uttarakhand High Court and based on the law laid down by the Supreme Court in the case of Female Workers (Muster Roll) (Supra), petitions have been allowed and directions issued to grant benefit to the employees. The Division Bench of the Allahabad High Court in the case of Dr. Parul Mishra Vs. State of U.P. decided on 27th January, 2010 in the case of a Lecturer working as Government and Post Graduate College on contract basis, after applying the laid down in the Supreme Court Female Workers (Muster Roll) (Supra) held that the employees therein was entitled to avail maternity benefit as is applicable to regularly lecturer in the Government College and identical contention of the State Government counsel to say that contractual employees are not entitled for maternity benefit was rejected. It was held by the learned High Court that the maternity leave does not change with the nature of employment. It is concerned with human right of a women and the employer and the Courts are bound under the constitutional scheme guaranteeing right to life, a right to live with dignity and protect the health of both mother and child, and after taking note of identical principle, petitions have been allowed. Similarly, the Rajsthan High Court in various writ petitions has directed for granting benefit to contract and temporary employees who are also claiming identical benefit in the cases of Civil Writ No.1598/2017 - Meenakshi Rao Vs. State of Rajasthan & others decided on 14th February, 2017 following earlier an judgment of the Rajasthan High Court rendered by Division Bench in the case of Neetu Choudhary Vs. State of Rajasthan & others (2008) Vol.-II RNW page 1404 (Raj). The Punjab & Haryana High Court has also granted similar benefit and allowed identical writ petition in the case of Anima Goel Vs. Haryana State Agricultural Development Corporation (2007) Vol.III LLJ page 64, Punjab & Haryana and the Uttarakhand High Court has allowed a writ petition on identical terms in the case of Smt. Nidhi Choudhary Vs. State of Uttarakhand Writ Petition No.1866/2016 decided on 27.09.2016. Copies of all these judgments available in the website of Indian Kanoon Organization have been produced before us for perusal and we find that in all these cases after applying the law laid down by the Supreme Court as detailed here-in-above, identical writ petitions have been allowed and contractual employees have been directed to be granted the benefit of maternity leave at par with regular employees and we see no reason to take different view.