Uttarakhand High Court
Pramod Kumar And Others. ... vs State Of Uttarakhand And Others on 20 November, 2024
Author: Manoj Kumar Tiwari
Bench: Manoj Kumar Tiwari
2024:UHC:8619-DB
HIGH COURT OF UTTARAKHAND AT NAINITAL
HON'BLE THE ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE MR. MANOJ
KUMAR TIWARI
AND
HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE VIVEK BHARTI SHARMA
20TH NOVEMBER, 2024
WRIT PETITION (S/B) NO. 70 OF 2024
Pramod Kumar and others. .......Petitioners.
Versus
State of Uttarakhand and others. ...........Respondents
WRIT PETITION (S/B) NO. 57 OF 2024
Jagdish Singh Bisht and others. .......Petitioners.
Versus
State of Uttarakhand and others. ...........Respondents
WRIT PETITION (S/B) NO. 195 OF 2024
Arvind Mohan and others. .......Petitioners.
Versus
State of Uttarakhand and others. ...........Respondents
&
WRIT PETITION (S/B) NO. 389 OF 2024
Anand Ballabh and others. .......Petitioners.
Versus
State of Uttarakhand and others. ...........Respondents
Counsel for the petitioners : Mr. Abhijay Negi, Ms. Snigdha Tiwari,
& Mr. Tushar Upadhyay, learned
counsel.
Counsel for the respondents : Mr. P.C. Bisht, learned Additional
Chief Standing Counsel, Ms. Puja
Banga and Mr. B.S. Parihar, learned
Brief Holder for the State.
Mr. Ashish Joshi and Ms. Menaka
Tripathi, learned counsel for
Uttarakhand Public Service
Commission.
JUDGMENT :
(per Mr. Manoj Kumar Tiwari, A.C.J.)
Petitioners are serving as Lecturers in different
Government Intermediate Colleges in the State of
Uttarakhand. In this bunch of writ petitions, they have
challenged validity of Rule 5(3)(b) of Uttarakhand State
Education (Teaching Cadre) Gazetted Service Rules,
2022. The said Rule provides that Lecturer, having 10
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years of service, alone shall be eligible for participating
in the examination, for appointment to the post of
Principal, Government Intermediate College.
2. According to petitioners, the said condition is
arbitrary, unjust and violative of Articles 14 and 16 of
the Constitution of India.
3. Learned State Counsel, however, submits that
validity of Rule 5(3)(b) of the aforesaid Rules,
impugned in this bunch of writ petitions, has been
upheld by this Court in Writ Petition (S/B) No. 135 of
2024 titled as 'Trivuwan Chandra Lobiyal and others vs.
State of Uttarakhand and others' and other connected
writ petitions. Paragraph Nos. 19 and 25 of judgment
dated 08.04.2024 passed by this Court in Writ Petition
(S/B) No. 135 of 2024 are extracted herein below:-
"19. It is not the case of the petitioners that,
because of the classification made by Rule 8 read
with Rule 5(3)(b) of the Service Rules, their right
to be considered for promotion has been taken
away or that they will suffer stagnation for want of
promotional avenue. In fact, the promotion
avenue, which was available to them before 2022,
is still available to them and all Lecturers,
irrespective of their marks in Post Graduate
examination, are eligible for promotion to the post
of Head Master, Government High School, as per
their seniority.
25. As per the Constitutional Scheme,
appointment to services and posts in connection
with the affairs of Union or of a State has to be
made strictly as per merit and the only exception
to this Rule is appointment given to weaker
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sections of society by way of affirmative action.
Thus, the contention raised on behalf of
petitioners that the classification based on marks
scored in Post Graduate examination is not
permissible, cannot be accepted. Since merit is a
constitutionally accepted criteria of selection for
appointment to public services, therefore,
classification based on merit in the qualifying
examination/ Post Graduate examination, cannot
be said to be invalid. Thus, the 11 challenge
thrown by petitioners to validity of Rule 8 read
with Rule 5(3)(b) of Uttarakhand State Education
(Teaching Cadre) Gazetted Service Rules, 2022, is
without any substance. The advertisement issued
in terms of the said Rules, therefore also cannot
be interfered with. The writ petitions therefore are
liable to be dismissed and are hereby dismissed.
There will be no order as to costs."
4. By relying on the aforesaid judgment, learned
State Counsel submits that this bunch of writ petitions
deserves to be dismissed, as similar petitions filed by
similarly situated persons serving in different
Government Intermediate Colleges, have already been
dismissed.
5. Learned counsel for petitioners, however, submits
that there is one argument, which was not considered
in the earlier judgment. He submits that there are
separate rules in respect of the post of Principal in
Government Aided Intermediate Colleges, which were
notified on 10th July, 2009; in the said Rules,
candidates, having five years of teaching experience on
the post of lecturer, is eligible for participating in the
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selection for appointment to the post of Principal of
Government Aided Intermediate Colleges, while under
the Rules in question, which are applicable to
Government Intermediate Colleges, minimum service
required as Lecturer is 10 years. Thus, he submits that
the requirement of 10 years is unjust and in deviance
with the condition mentioned in the Rules applicable to
government aided institutions.
6. The submission now raised by learned counsel for
petitioners is bereft of merit. Validity of statutory rules
can be questioned only on the ground that it is violative
of the fundamental rights or any other constitutional
provision. Merely because the provision of service
rules, which has been challenged in this bunch of writ
petitions, is in deviance with some other service rules,
applicable in respect of a different set of institutions,
cannot be a ground for questioning validity of Rule
5(3)(b) of Uttarakhand State Education (Teaching
Cadre) Gazetted Service Rules, 2022.
7. Law is well settled that employer can prescribe the
eligibility conditions for promotion or direct recruitment
to a post. The State Government, in its wisdom, has
prescribed 10 years' qualifying service as lecturer for
becoming eligible to participate in the examination for
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appointment to the post of Principal, Government
Intermediate College. It is not that lecturers serving in
Government Intermediate Colleges have been deprived
of their right to be considered for promotion. That right
is still available to them as per their seniority. Thus,
petitioners will have to wait for their turn and they will
get promotion to the post of Principal, Government
Intermediate College, when it becomes due to them as
per their seniority position in the cadre. Rule 5(3)(b)
gives them fast track promotion, through limited
Departmental Examination.
8. In the case of Chandan Banerjee & others vs.
Krishna Prosad Ghosh & others, reported in
(2022) 15 SCC 453, Hon'ble Supreme Court has
reiterated that judicial review in cases where
classification is challenged, is limited to a determination
of whether the classification is reasonable and bears a
nexus to the object sought to be achieved and further
Courts cannot indulge in a mathematical evaluation of
the basis of classification or replace the wisdom of the
legislature or its delegate with their own.
9. Even otherwise also, State as an employer, has
certain inherent rights. One of such right is to
prescribe eligibility conditions for appointment to a post
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under the State. Courts interference with the eligibility
condition prescribed by the State Government in the
Service Rules would be warranted only when it neither
has any intelligible differentia nor has any nexus with
the object sought to be achieved; in other words, the
conditions prescribed are so irrational which no
reasonable person could have prescribed.
10. In the case of State of Jammu & Kashmir vs.
Shri Triloki Nath Khosa & others, reported in
(1974) 1 SCC 19, it has been held by Constitution
Bench of Hon'ble Supreme Court that classification
based on educational qualification, is valid. It was
further held in the said judgment that where a party
seeks to impeach the validity of a rule made by a
competent authority on the ground that the Rule
offends Article 14, the burden is on him to plead and
prove the infirmity and further that there is always a
presumption in favour of the constitutionality of an
enactment and the burden is upon him who attacks it
to show that there has been a clear transgression of
the constitutional principles.
11. Thus, this Court is not persuaded to take a
different view in the matter than that taken by this
Court in Writ Petition (S/B) No. 135 of 2024 titled as
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'Trivuwan Chandra Lobiyal and others vs. State of
Uttarakhand and others'. Accordingly, all the writ
petitions are decided in terms of the judgment dated
08.04.2024 passed in Writ Petition (S/B) No. 135 of
2024 and other connected writ petitions.
_________________________
MANOJ KUMAR TIWARI, A.C.J.
_____________________
VIVEK BHARTI SHARMA, J.
Dt: 20th November, 2024
Rathour
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Date: 2024.11.22 12:14:13 +05'30'
