Lalit Kumar vs State Of U.P. And 2 Others
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Allahabad High Court

Lalit Kumar vs State Of U.P. And 2 Others on 12 March, 2025

HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
 
 


Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:39986
 

 
RESERVED
 
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
 
***
 
WRIT - A NO. 13257 OF 2024
 
Lalit Kumar				                            	    ....Petitioner
 
Versus
 
State of U.P. and others           	                             ....Respondents
 

 
Appearance :-
 
For Petitioner  	 	: 	 	       Mr. Ashok Khare, Senior 							 Advocate with Mr. Sunil 							  Kumar Srivastava 
 
For Respondents	: 	   	 	 Mr. Jai Bahadur Singh, 							 Advocate for respondent 							  No. 2
 
							  Mr. S.C. Upadhyay, 								  Standing Counsel for State
 

 
HON'BLE J.J. MUNIR, J.

This writ petition is directed against an order dated 20.08.2024 passed by the Chairman and Administrator, Greater Sharda Sahayak Samadesh Kshetra Vikas Pariyojana, Lucknow, terminating the services of the petitioner as a Junior Assistant and offering him appointment on a Class-IV post in accordance with the amended provisions of the U.P. Recruitment of Dependants of Government Servants (Dying-in-Harness) Rules, 19741.

2. The petitioner's father, the late Lajjaram, an employee of the respondents, died in harness on 10.08.2014. The petitioner applied for compassionate appointment under the Rules of 1974. He was granted compassionate appointment as a Junior Assistant in the Office of the Soil Conservator Officer, Irrigation & Water Resource Department, Jalaun at Orai. The post of a Junior Assistant that the petitioner was appointed to under the Rules of 1974 required proficiency in typing skills. In case of compassionate appointment to a post, where typing skills are a per-requisite, the proviso to Rule 5(1)(i) of the Rules of 1974 initially provided that if the Government Servant does not possess the required proficiency in typing-writing, he shall be appointed subject to the condition that the requisite typing speed of 25 words in Hindi per minute would be acquired within one year. In case the appointee fails to do so, his annual increment would be withheld, granting him one more year to acquire the requisite speed in type-writing. However, if the Government servant, appointed on compassionate ground to such a post, failed to acquire the requisite typing speed within the extended time period of one year, his services would be dispensed with. This provision in the Rules of 1974 was amended by the 13th Amendment in the year 2022 to provide that in the event of failure of the Government servant appointed on compassionate ground in the second test held after the further period of one year, he would be issued with an appointment letter for a Class-IV post. The appointment granted on the Class-IV posts would be deemed to a fresh appointment and not a reversion. It is also stipulated that if the Government servant does not join the Class-IV post within the time stipulated, his services would stand terminated.

3. The petitioner's case is that he was asked to sit his first typing test on 26.09.2015 or thereabout, the result whereof was declared on 26.09.2015. Along with the petitioner, ten other employees also sat the typing proficiency test. Two of these employees, namely, Sandeep Kumar and Amit Kumar, who appeared in the typing test, but failed, have been promoted to the post of Senior Assistant vide order dated 30.09.2019 passed by the Soil Conservation Officer, Irrigation & Water Resource Department, Jalaun at Orai. There is a case that the petitioner having worked for a period of five years as a Junior Assistant, he should have been promoted to the post of a Senior Assistant upon completion of five years service. Reliance in this connection has been placed on a Government Order dated 17.01.2014. The petitioner says that his reversion to a Class-IV post by the impugned order is illegal because by time vide the order impugned dated 20.08.2024, he was reverted to the Class-IV post, the petitioner having put in nine years of service ought have been promoted, instead of being reverted.

4. Aggrieved by the order dated 20.08.2024, this petition has been instituted under Article 226 of the Constitution.

5. A notice of motion was issued on 31.08.2024. A counter affidavit has been filed on behalf of respondent no. 2 to which the petitioner has put in a rejoinder. It was admitted to hearing on 24.09.2024 which proceeded forthwith. Judgment was reserved.

6. Heard Mr. Ashok Khare, learned Senior Advocate assisted by Mr. Sunil Kumar Srivastava, learned Counsel for the petitioner, Mr. Jai Bahadur Singh, learned Counsel appearing on behalf of respondent no. 2 and Mr. Sharad Chandra Upadhyay, learned Standing Counsel appearing on behalf of the State-respondents. No affidavit has been filed on behalf of the State.

7. Upon hearing the learned Counsel for the parties, this Court finds that it is true that there are lots of irregularities on the respondents' part in holding the first and the second typing test on schedule. The petitioner appears to have incorrectly asserted in paragraph no. 7 of the writ petition that the typing test was held sometime in the month of September, 2015, the result whereof was declared on 26.09.2015. A perusal of the Annexure no. 3 annexed by the petitioner shows that though at the head of the documents, the date is shown as 26.09.2015, but the contents show that, in fact, the typing test was held on 17.08.2016. In paragraph no. 26 of the counter affidavit, it is stated that the date of the document annexed as Annexure no. 3 is 26.09.2016. That is logical because the test having been held as per the contents of the memo on 17.08.2016, the declaration of result would logically be a by document dated 26.09.2016; not 26.09.2015. Apparently, the date mentioned by the petitioner at the top of the document carried in Annexure no. 3 is the result of a typographical error. No case has been set up on the basis of the said date or any point argued. In consequence, we are of opinion and that this is not a case of any deliberate suppression or incorrect mention of the date of declaration of the result relating to the first typing test. What is rather intriguing is the fact that the respondents do not deny that the document annexed as Annexure No. 3 to the writ petition is a declaration of the petitioner's result for his first typing proficiency test. All that they dispute is that its date is 26.09.2016 and not 26.09.2015. We also believe that the date of the document is 26th September, 2016. If the result of the petitioner's first typing proficiency test was declared on 26.9.2016, one fails to understand how in the order impugned, the date of the petitioner's first typing test that he is shown to have failed is indicated to have been held on 01.12.2020. The result of this test, according to the impugned order, was declared on 04.12.2020. The second typing proficiency test was held on 07.12.2021, which too the petitioner failed, as the impugned order shows with the declaration of its result on 21.12.2021.

8. It is the respondents' consistent case and rightly so that three typing proficiency tests are not in the scheme of the Rules of 1974. How then a proficiency test for the petitioner was held on 17.08.2016, the result whereof was declared on 26.09.2016 to be followed by another typing proficiency test on 01.12.2020, and still another, on 07.12.2021. The impugned order speaks of only two typing proficiency tests, to wit, one held on 01.12.2020, and the other, on 07.12.2021, which have been referred to as the first and the second typing proficiency tests. How does then the typing test held for the petitioner on 17.08.2016, the result whereof was declared on 26.09.2016, figure in the scheme of things. It is difficult to understand. In fact, it is impossible to reconcile.

9. There is another oddity about the manner in which the petitioner's typing proficiency tests were undertaken. Going by the letter of the Rules of 1974, the first test should have been held at the end of one year of appointment on the post of a Junior Assistant and failing that test, after withholding the petitioner's increment, he ought have been subjected to a second test at the end of the second year of his employment as a Junior Assistant. If he failed that test, his employment as a Junior Assistant should have been determined and the petitioner offered a Class-IV post. This has not happened at all in this case. What appears is that the petitioner was permitted to continue as a Junior Assistant after his initial appointment on 09.02.2015 right up to 20.08.2024 when the impugned order was passed. The petitioner, thus, continued on the position of a Junior Assistant for a period as long as nine years dehors the rules. Whatever fate awaited the petitioner had to befall within two years of his appointment on 19.02.2015. Therefore, the entire facility of acquiring skills should have been given to the petitioner up to the month of February, 2017 and a decision taken in accordance with Rules. There was utter breach of rules on the respondents' part, as we have noticed, and the petitioner virtually drifted in his employment as a Junior Assistant for nine years until he failed, as the respondents would have made us believe, finally in the second typing proficiency test held on 07.12.2021. We do not think that the test held on 07.12.2021 was the second typing proficiency test. It was a superfluous third test.

10. Whichever way the matter is looked at, the petitioner after his initial appointment as a Junior Assistant has been given both of his opportunities to sit the typing proficiency test. If there has been any irregularity in holding the two successive typing tests, violating schedule, it is to the petitioner's advantage; not his disadvantage. He has not been prejudiced in any manner by the irregular schedule of the typing proficiency tests. The petitioner has failed both the typing tests and no third test is contemplated under the Rules of 1974.

11. In the circumstances, we are of opinion that there is no infirmity in the order impugned calling for interference by this Court in exercise of our jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution. This petition fails and is dismissed.

12. There shall be no order as to costs.

Allahabad

March 12, 2025

Deepak

(J.J. MUNIR)

JUDGE

Whether the order is speaking : Yes/No

Whether the order is reportable : Yes/No