Delhi High Court

The Chairman Railway Board And Ors vs R.K.Verma on 17 August, 2012

Author: Badar Durrez Ahmed

         THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
%                                      Judgment delivered on: 17.08.2012

+       W.P.(C) 8464/2011

THE CHAIRMAN RAILWAY BOARD AND ORS                             ... Petitioner

                                          versus

R.K.VERMA                                                      ... Respondent
Advocates who appeared in this case:
For the Appellant            : Mr Krishna Kumar
For the Respondent           : Mr Ajit Singh

CORAM:-
HON'BLE MR JUSTICE BADAR DURREZ AHMED
HON'BLE MR JUSTICE SIDDHARTH MRIDUL

                                       JUDGMENT

BADAR DURREZ AHMED, J (ORAL)

1. This writ petition is directed against the order dated 14.07.2011 passed

by the Central Administrative Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi in

OA 2752/2010. By virtue of the impugned order, the Tribunal has allowed

the respondent's said Original application and has directed as under:-

"8. For the reasons stated within, the Original Application succeeds. The Respondents are directed (i) to convene a Review Selection Committee to consider eligible 1980 batch IRSE officers including the Applicant for the sixth vacant slot of DRM; (ii) in case the Applicant gets selected for the sixth slot, he shall be posted as DRM; and (iii) the Respondents would

comply with the directions (i) and (ii) within 9 weeks from the date of receipt of certified copy of this order. There is no order as to costs."

2. The respondent is an IRSE (Indian Railway Service of Engineers)

Officer of the 1980 batch and was working as a Chief Track Engineer at the

time of the filing of the Original Application and is now working as a Senior

Deputy General Manager, Western Railways in the Senior Administrative

Grade (SAG). The grievance of the respondent was that he had been denied

the opportunity of being considered and posted as a Divisional Railway

Manager (DRM), whereas five of his batch-mates had been posted as DRMs.

The respondent filed the said Original Application seeking a prayer to direct

the petitioner to post him as a DRM at the next available opportunity. It is in

that context that the Tribunal, after hearing the counsel for the parties and

examining the case, made the abovementioned directions.

3. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the posting of

officers as Divisional Railway Managers is based upon guidelines which

have been followed by the petitioner for the last over 20 years. The basic

features of the said policy guidelines as spelt out in the writ petition are as

under:-

"a. ...............the Short-List for the posts of DRMs is prepared annually by considering the suitability of Senior Administrative Grade Officers of the eight (08) Organised Group 'A' Railway Services. The Short List is prepared in a manner such that the latest batch in the zone of consideration from each service belongs to the same batch year. The officers from the previous batches who have not yet been posted as DRMs and who fulfill other eligibility criteria also, form the zone of consideration for the purpose of formation of Short List.

b. Officers to be posted as DRMs should have generally 'Very Good+' Confidential Reports. They should have been assessed as 'Outstanding' at least twice during the preceding five (5) years and should have a minimum of two (2) clearances for posting as DRM, including one clearance in the latest two (2) ACRs or should have a minimum of three (3) clearances including one (1) in the latest two (2) ACRs.

c. The officer should not be more than 52 years of age on the cut-off date, i.e., 1st of April of the year of preparation of Short List.

d. The officer should be clear from Vigilance angle.

e. From each service and from each batch-year, a maximum of six (6) officers are included in the Short List.

f. Normally, officers with around 22-26 years Group 'A' are selected for posting as DRMs, on recognition of the fact that the task is arduous in nature and the relativity younger officers would be preferable for the same.

g. The normal tenure of a DRM is around 2 - 3 years.

h. While posting officers as DRMs, care is taken to see that in each batch those with excellent record and age in their favour

are posted to heavier Divisions so as to gain valuable experience. Therefore, the posting of DRMs is not made strictly in the order in which the names appear in the Short List a junior officer can be considered for posting ahead of a senior officer within the Short List at the time of posting. There is also no guarantee that all short-listed officers will get posted as DRMs, as there is also a limitation of the number of posts to be held by a service.

i. Officers who refuse posting as DRMs are not considered for such posting for a period of two years from the date of refusal."

4. We may notice at this stage itself that the guideline referred to in 'e'

above itself indicates that from each service and from each batch-year, a

maximum of six officers are included in the shortlist. This, by itself, means

that there could be less than six officers and it is not at all necessary that six

officers must be appointed as DRMs in a particular year. In the present case

what has happened is that six persons were shortlisted. The last of the six

persons was one Mr P. K. Misra. However, he had refused to join as a

DRM. The next senior-most person in the IRSE is the respondent Mr R. K.

Verma. The said Mr R. K. Verma was not selected because six senior

officers from his batch had already been shortlisted. According to the

learned counsel for the respondent, the respondent's case was that since the

sixth slot had not been filled in because Mr P. K. Misra had refused to join as

a DRM, the respondent's case ought to have been considered for filling up

the sixth slot of 1980 batch of IRSE officers.

5. We find that the Tribunal has essentially been guided by the

understanding that the respondent's non-selection to the DRM post would

deprive him of his future prospects for being considered for the post of a

General Manager as he would be allegedly lacking the required service

experience as a DRM. It is for this reason, that the Tribunal came to the

conclusion that non-consideration of the respondent for the sixth slot for the

DRM posting had positively prejudiced him and it is because of this that the

Tribunal came to the following conclusion:-

"......Though DRM post is not a promotion post but guidelines provides (i) lateral posting from 8 services through a selection process, (ii) a quota of 6 from each service exist and (iii) minimum of 2 years experience in the DRM post is a condition for officers to be considered for the promotion to the post of GM, the principles of promotion mutatis mutandis would be applicable in this case.

6. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the assumption

on the part of the Tribunal that the non-selection of the respondent to the

position of DRM would deprive him of his future prospects for being

considered for the post of General Manager is without any basis. He drew

our attention to the following sub-paragraphs of paragraph 2 of the writ

petition itself:-

"j. Non-posting of an officer as DRM does not adversely affect his chances for being considered for next promotion to the Higher Administrative Grade and above, subject to his fulfilling the other eligibility conditions for the same.

k. Non-posting of an officer as DRM will also not adversely affect his chances of being considered for various posts of General Manager/equivalent, which are ex-cadres posts above the posts in Higher Administrative Grade. Subject to fulfilling of laid down norms, such an officer is eligible for consideration for various posts of General Managers/equivalent. This issue has been submitted in detail at para 3 (k) [sic: 4(k)] below."

He then referred to paragraph 4 (k) of the writ petition which reads as

under:-

"k. The observation of the Ld. Tribunal that non-selection to the post of DRM would deprive the respondent of his consideration for the post of General Manager is also devoid of merits. The posts of General Managers/equivalent are in the Scale of Rs. 75,500 - 80,000/-, i.e., two stages higher than SA Grade in which the respondent is now working. These posts do not belong to any service or cadre and are not promotional posts. These posts are filled up through appointment by the Government at the highest level and officers belonging to the 8 Group 'A' services fulfilling the laid down criteria are considered for the posts of General Manager/equivalent. Non- working of the respondent as DRM does not by itself render him ineligible for being considered for the posts of General Managers/equivalent. Subject to fulfilling of the other norms, he will be eligible for consideration for various posts of General Manager/equivalent, such as Production Units, Construction

Organisation, RDSO/Lucknow and Railway Staff College/ Vadodara. However, posting as DRM is also no guarantee for being considered for the posts of General Managers/equivalent."

(underlining added)

7. Therefore, according to the learned counsel for the petitioner, the very

premise on which the decision of the Tribunal is founded is not in accord

with the actual position. He has reiterated in the course of his submissions

that the non-working of the respondent as a DRM would not by itself render

him ineligible for being considered for all the posts of General Managers.

The clear case of the petitioner is that just because the respondent has not

been posted as a DRM will not come in the way, subject to his fulfilling the

other eligibility conditions, for his consideration for any of the posts of

General Managers and this is also evident from the clear averments in this

regard mentioned in the writ petition which we have referred to above.

8. Consequently, we are of the view that the Tribunal has wrongly

assumed that in case the respondent is not posted as a DRM, it would be an

impediment in respect of the consideration of his case for promotion to the

post of a General Manager. That being the position, since the premise on

which the Tribunal's direction is based, is itself faulty, we set aside the

impugned order. But, we make it clear that this has been done on the

position explained by the petitioner that the fact that the respondent has not