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(iii) If the notice sent by registered post is returned un-served, it shall be published in the official Gazette and, upon such publication, it shall be deemed to have been personally served on such Government Servant on the date it was published in the Official Gazette."

17. The petitioner's service conditions, as a CRPF Constable (probationer), were admittedly governed by the 1955 Rules. The CCS Rules can be made applicable in respect of a CRPF, Constable, when the Rules governing his service i.e., CRPF Rules, are silent over an issue sought to be dealt with. One would find that the exigency, as has occasioned in the present case, was very much covered by the CRPF Rules 1955, therefore, there was no occasion for the respondents to have pressed into service the General Rules i.e., CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965, as the said rules are only supplementing and or providing an aid to the special set of rules-CRPF Rules only where the said Special Set of Rules are silent about a particular service exigency.

21. Moreover, Rule 102 of the 1955 Rules provides that any matter for which no provision is made in the said 1955 Rules, such condition of service of the members of the Force shall be the same as are for the time being applicable to other Officers of the Government of India of corresponding status. This would mean that the CCS Rules in respect of petitioner were to be made applicable only if there was no provision in the CRPF Rules to take care of such exigency. But since the issue in question is squarely covered by Rule 16 of the CRPF Rules, therefore, the respondents were not justified in any way to apply the General Law i.e., the CCS Rules. The action being not in conformity with law, had to be set right and has rightly been done so by the writ court.

22. A perusal of the Rule 16 of the CRPF Rules, supra, unambiguously, reveal that termination of a CRPF probationer, (as was the status of the petitioner), is governed by such Rule providing that a probationer can be terminated within a period of three years service on one month's notice by the appointing authority. The respondents, however, have bypassed the special regime and invoked Rule 5 of the 1965 Rules. Such an approach offends the settled principle generalia specialibus non derogant - general provisions must yield to special provisions. Therefore, the action suffers from a jurisdictional error.