Bombay High Court
The Secty. Dept. Of Urban Devp. & 3 ... vs Prakash Ganpatrao Bhukte And 6 Ors on 2 May, 2017
Bench: V.A. Naik
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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY
NAGPUR BENCH AT NAGPUR
WRIT PETITION NO.524/2007
PETITIONERS :- 1. The Secretary,
Department of Urban Development
Mantralaya, Mumbai.
2. The Director, Town Planning Department,
Maharashtra State, Central Building,
Pune - 411 001.
3. The Secretary,
General Administration Department,
Mantralaya, Mumbai.
4. The Secretary,
Ministry of Finance, Mantralaya, Mumbai - 32.
...VERSUS...
RESPONDENTS :- 1. Prakash Ganpatrao Bhukte,
Aged 26 yrs., Asstt. Town Planner,
O/o Urban Land Ceiling, Nagpur,
Collectorate Premises, Ngapur.
2. Ms. Pratibha Wasudeo Bujade,
Aged about 25 yrs., Asstt. Town Planner,
O/o Dy. Director of Town Planning,
Nagpur Division, Nagpur, Old Secretariat,
Nagpur.
3. Chunnilal Shankarrao Zade,
Aged about 29 yrs., Planning Asstt.
O/o Town Planner, Kelkarwadi, Arvi Road,
Wardha.
4. Sanjaya Arunrao Deshpande,
Aged about 23 years, Planning Asstt.
O/o Asstt. Director of Town Planning,
New Ramdaspeth, East High Court Rd., Nagpur.
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5. Shankar Haribhau Gotey (Dead)
through L.R.
Smt. Suman Shankar Gote (Wife)
R/o Plot No.876, Karla Chowk,
Arvi Road, Manas Mandir, Wardha.
6. Anil Virendra Shravane,
Aged about 38 years, Asstt. Town
Planner, o/o Dy. Director of Town Planning,
Nagpur Division, Nagpur, Old Secretariat,
Nagpur.
7. Rajendra Ramkrishnarao Samarth,
Aged about 42 yrs., Asstt. Town Planner,
O/o Asstt. Director of Town Planning,
New Ramdaspeth, Nagpur on behalf of
Tantrik Karmachari, Kriti Samiti.
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Shri A.M. Joshi, AGP for petitioners
Shri M.M. Agnihotri, Advocate for respondent nos.1, 2, 4 and 6
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CORAM : SMT. VASANTI A NAIK, AND
MRS. SWAPNA JOSHI, JJ.
DATE : 02.05.2017
ORAL JUDGMENT (PER : SMT. VASANTI A. NAIK, J.)
By this writ petition, the petitioners - State of Maharashtra
and others challenge the order of the Maharashtra Administrative
Tribunal, dated 13.4.2005 allowing the original application filed by the
respondents and directing the petitioners to pay arrears of salary to the
respondents w.e.f. 1.1.1981.
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The respondents were appointed in 1980s as Planning
Assistants in the Department of Urban Development. The posts of
Planning Assistants/Junior Engineers and Assistant Town Planners were
Class-III posts. Some time in the year 1981, the State of Maharashtra took
a policy decision to give the status of Class-II Gazetted Officers to the
Junior Engineers working in various Departments under the State
Government. The said policy statement was firstly made on the floor of
the Legislative Assembly by the Hon'ble Minister for Irrigation, Food and
Civil Supplies and subsequently, the Government Resolution in that
regard was issued on 16.4.1984. By the said Resolution, the State
Government decided to grant status of Class-II Gazetted Officers to all
Graduate Junior Engineers who had put in five years of service and they
were granted the pays scale of Rs.600-950/- w.e.f. 1.4.1981. In
furtherance of the said policy, the Rural Development Department of the
State Government also issued a similar Resolution on 9.6.1986 granting
almost similar benefits to the Graduate and Diploma Holder Engineers
working in the Rural Development Department. The benefits of the said
Resolution were made available to the Junior Engineers working in the
Rural Development Department w.e.f. 1.4.1981. Similar Resolutions were
passed by the State Government for granting the status of Class-II
Gazetted Officers and also granting the monetary benefits flowing from
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the same to the Housing and Special Assistance Department, Agricultural
and Co-operation Department and several other Departments of the State
Government. In the year 1995, the Resolution was passed by the Urban
Development Department granting similar benefits to the Junior
Engineers but not to the Assistant Town Planners like the respondents. In
the year 1997, the State Government decided to grant similar benefits to
the Assistant Town Planners like the respondents but by the said
Resolution, dated 7.7.1997 the monetary benefits flowing from the said
upgradation were payable w.e.f. 17.4.1996 and not from 1.4.1981, as
were granted to the Junior Engineers working in all the other
Departments of the State Government. Since the monetary benefits
flowing from the said upgradation were granted to the Junior Engineers in
all other Departments of the State Government w.e.f. 1.4.1981, the
respondents filed a writ petition bearing Writ Petition No.201/1989
seeking the arrears of salary payable to them in terms of their upgradation
as per the Government Resolution dated 7.7.1997. After the Maharashtra
Administrative Tribunals were established under the Administrative
Tribunals Act, the said writ petition was transferred to the Maharashtra
Administrative Tribunal for a decision. The Maharashtra Administrative
Tribunal has allowed the original application filed by the respondents and
has directed the petitioners to grant the monetary benefits to the
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respondents w.e.f. 1.4.1981 and/or from the date of their appointments.
The said order is challenged by the petitioners in the instant petition.
Shri Joshi, the learned Assistant Government Pleader
appearing on behalf of the petitioners submitted that the Tribunal was not
justified in directing the petitioners to grant monetary benefits flowing
from the policy in the Government Resolution dated 7.7.1997 to the
respondents w.e.f. 1.4.1981. It is submitted that it is within the domain of
the Government to consider granting the actual monetary benefits to the
employees from a particular date. It is submitted that though the Assistant
Town Planners like the respondents were given the status of Class-II
Gazetted Officers in terms of the Government Resolution dated 7.7.1997,
the actual monetary benefits were made available to the respondents from
the earlier date i.e. 17.4.1996. It is submitted that the Tribunal has
wrongly allowed the original application filed by the respondents after
holding that the State Government cannot discriminate between the
employees of different Departments though they are at par in their duties
and status.
Shri Agnihotri, the learned Counsel for the respondents has
supported the order of the Tribunal. It is submitted that for the Junior
Engineers working in every Department of the State Government, the
State Government had decided to grant the actual monetary benefits
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w.e.f. 1.4.1981 and the State Government had discriminated between the
employees of the other Departments and the respondents and granted the
benefit to the respondents w.e.f. 17.4.1996. It is submitted that it is laid
down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in a catena of judgments that the
principle of equal pay for equal work and reasonable classification would
require the State Government to grant similar benefits to the employees,
on parity. It is submitted that where a policy is contrary to law or is
arbitrary and irrational, the same needs to be interfered with. It is
submitted that when the State Government had granted the status of
Class-II Gazetted Officers to all the Junior Engineers working in the other
Departments of the State Government w.e.f. 1.4.1981 and had also made
the monetary benefits flowing from the said decision available to those
employees w.e.f. 1.4.1981, there is no propriety in the action on the part
of the State Government to make the actual monetary benefits available to
only one set of employees like the respondents w.e.f. 17.4.1996. It is
stated that the action on the part of the petitioners in granting the benefits
to the respondents from 17.4.1996 while granting the same to the other
similarly situated employees w.e.f. 1.4.1981 is arbitrary and
discriminatory and is violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. It
is stated that when the benefits of similar policy of granting the status of
Class-II Gazetted Officers and making the pay scale applicable to them
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from 1.4.1981 was not granted to the Junior Engineers working in Forest
Department, they had filed a writ petition that was transferred to the
Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal for a decision. It is stated that after
the said original application was allowed and the Tribunal directed the
State Government to pay the actual monetary benefits to the Junior
Engineers working in the Forest Department w.e.f. 1.4.1981, the State
Government has implemented the said order. It is stated that the State
Government is implementing similar orders in other matters while
challenging the order passed in favour of the respondents by the Tribunal
in the instant petition. The learned Counsel relied on the judgments,
reported in (1982) 1 SCC 618 [Randhir Singh...Versus...Union of India
and others], (2004) 6 SCC 218 [State of Mizoram and
another...Versus...Mizoram Engineering Service Association and
another), (2015) 7 SCC 698 [State of Madhya Pradesh and
others...Versus...Mala Banerjee], (2008) 1 SCC 586 [Union of
India...Versus...Dineshan K.K.], 2000 (2) Bom. C.R. 522 [Dr. Suresh
Srikrishna Naik...Versus...Karamveer Hire Rural Institute & others]
and (2003) 5 SCC 333 [Commissioner of Central
Excise...Versus...M.P.V. & Engg. Industries].
On hearing the learned Counsel for the parties and on a
perusal of the impugned order, it appears that there is no scope for
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interference with the impugned order in exercise of the writ jurisdiction.
After the State Government took a policy decision to grant the status of
Class-II Gazetted Officers to the Junior Engineers working in the different
Departments of the State Government from time to time in 1980s and
1990s, the State Government decided to grant the upgradation w.e.f.
1.4.1981 and also grant the actual monetary benefits to them w.e.f.
1.4.1981. Only in the case of the respondents, i.e., Junior Engineers
working in the Town Planning Department and in respect of the Junior
Engineers working in the Forest Department, the State Government had
not granted the benefits w.e.f. 1.4.1981. The original application filed by
the Junior Engineers working in the Forest Department was allowed and
the State Government was directed to grant the status of Class-II Gazetted
Officers to the Junior Engineers working in the Forest Department from
1.4.1981 and also grant the actual monetary benefits to them from the
said date. It is surprising that the State Government has implemented the
order of the Tribunal in Original Application No.3905/1992 decided on
7.4.1994, while choosing to file a writ petition against the order of the
Tribunal in the case of the respondents. It is not disputed by the learned
Assistant Government Pleader that in almost every Department of which a
reference is made in the original application and also in the additional
affidavit filed by the respondents, the actual monetary benefits flowing
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from the upgradation have been granted w.e.f. 1.4.1981. We had posed a
query to the learned Assistant Government Pleader on one of the previous
dates of hearing whether there is any Department of the State
Government wherein the Junior Engineers are not granted the actual
monetary benefits w.e.f 1.4.1981 but there is no reply to the said query. It
is apparent that the State Government had either decided to grant the
actual monetary benefits flowing from the upgradation to the Junior
Engineers working in every Department of the State Government except
the Forest Department and the Town Planning Department and to the
Junior Engineers working in the Forest Department, after the Tribunal
had allowed their original application, the benefit is granted to them
w.e.f. 1.4.1981. We also find that to several other Junior Engineers
working in the Urban Development Department, the actual monetary
benefits are made available w.e.f. 1.4.1981 after their original
applications were allowed. In the circumstances of the case, the Tribunal
was justified in holding that the State Government could not have
discriminated between similarly placed employees, working in all the
other Departments of the State Government on one side and the
respondents on the other. The judgments, reported in (1982) 1 SCC 618,
(2004) 6 SCC 218, (2015) 7 SCC 698, (2008) 1 SCC 586, 2000 (2)
Bom. C.R. 522 and (2003) 5 SCC 333 and relied on by the learned
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Counsel for the respondents clearly support the view expressed by the
Tribunal while allowing the original application filed by the respondents.
Since the order of the Tribunal is just and proper, we dismiss
the writ petition with no order as to costs. Rule stands discharged.
JUDGE JUDGE
Wadkar
