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3. The judgment in respect of which clarification is sought was concerned with the construction of Rules 3, 6, 8 and 10 of Punjab Police Service Rules 1959 ('Rules' for short). The Rules provided for the Constitution of Punjab Police Service concerning the cadre of Deputy Superintendents of Police. Recruitment to the service was to be made from two sources as directed in Rule 6 in the proportion of 80% by promotion from the rank of Inspector and 20% by direct recruitment. The special feature of the relevant rules was to be found in Rule 10 which provided that the seniority of members of the service shall be determined by the date of confirmation-in the service. There was thus a quota rule for recruitment and seniority was to be determined by the date of confirmation in the service. Ordinarily, when recruitment is from two sources after recruitment is made according to the quota rule, recruits from both the sources have to be integrated into one service. This always raises the thorny question of how to regulate seniority inter se amongst recruits from two independent sources. The Rules sought to solve the problem by making it obligatory to fix seniority of the members of the service with reference to the date of confirmation in the service. This, however, raised another question as to in what manner confirmation is to be given. That brought in for construction Rule 8 which provided that the members of the service shall be on probation for two years which shall include the period of training at the Police Training School, Phillaur, and in the districts and in the case of members promoted the Government may by a special order in each case, permit periods of officiating appointment to the service to count towards the period of probation. Thus, recruits from both the sources were to be on probation for a period of two years. However, Clause (b) of Rule 8 provided that the services of a member recruited by direct appointment may be dispensed with by Government on his failing to pass the final examination at the end of his period of training, or on his being reported on, during or at the end of his period of probation, as unfit for appointment. The proviso to Sub-rule (b) of Rule 8 enables the Government to extend the period of probation by not more than one year. On a conspectus of these rules the Court came to the conclusion that at the end of three years a direct recruit, if not found unfit for appointment, would automatically stand confirmed. That led to the other consequences that once the direct recruit either at the end of two years or by the maximum extended period of probation by one year would automatically get confirmation and from that very date his seniority would be reckoned. Now there was no provision for such automatic confirmation of the promotees to the service. A grievance was made that the promotee hangs on for a long period and gets confirmation later than the direct recruit with the result that he is adversely affected in seniority in comparison to a direct recruit who gets automatic confirmation and once by the operation of rules the direct recruit on account of automatic confirmation becomes senior he obtains an advantage of being considered for nomination to the I.P.S. earlier than the promotee. The bone of contention between the parties flows from the following two paragraphs in the judgment. They may be extracted :

4. The next paragraph which has to be read in conjunction with this paragraph is as under :

It may be pointed out that where recruitment is from two sources and the seniority in the cadre is determined according to the date of confirmation, to accord utmost fair treatment a rotational system has to be followed while giving confirmation. The quota rule would apply to vacancies and recruitment has to be made keeping in view the vacancies available to the two sources according to the quota. If the quota rule is strictly adhered to here will be no difficulty in giving confirmation keeping in view the quota rule even at the time of confirmation. A roster is introduced while giving confirmation ascertaining every time which post has fallen vacant and the recruit from that source has to be confirmed in the post available to the source. This system would breakdown the moment recruitment from either source in excess of the quota is made. In fact a strict adherence to the quota rule at the time of recruitment would introduce no difficulty in applying the rule at the time of confirmation because vacancies would be available for confirmation to persons belonging to different sources of recruitment. The difficulty arises when recruitment in excess of the quota is made and it is further accentuated when recruits from one source, to wit, in this case direct recruits get automatic confirmation on completion of the probationary period while the promotees hang out for years together before being confirmed.