The High Court disposed of the writ petition allowing the petitioner, based on principles laid down in MD. Gulam Mohammed v. Regional Manager, APSRTC, concerning tenure regularization of contract employees.
Writ petition disposed of subject to terms in MD. Gulam Mohammed case.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE NOOTY RAMAMOHANA RAO
WRIT PETITION No.9649 of 2013
ORDER:
There is since addendum on both sides that the cause in this writ petition is akin to the one which has fallen for resolution in MD.GULAM MOHAMMED Vs. REGIONAL MANAGER, APSRTC, HYDERABAD AND OTHERS decided by me on 14-09-2012 and since reported in 2013 (1) ALD 501. In paragraph 5, the principle has been set out in the following terms.
“Contract employees of the Corporation, working either as drivers or conductors or ministerial employees or semi-skilled employees, if were to be penalized on grounds of misconduct attributable to them, an enquiry ought to have been conducted and a fair opportunity should have been provided to them to defend themselves, as per the policy guidelines framed by the Corporation, as part of fairness in action. Since no such opportunity has been accorded by the Depot Managers before terminating the services of such contractual appointees, it is consistently held by this Court that such terminations cannot be treated as valid in the eye of law, but however, the period of service rendered by the employee concerned to the Corporation was ordered not to be totally ignored for the benefit of regularization. Therefore, the period of service rendered by the contractual appointees till their services were terminated, should be counted for the purpose of regularization of their service, inasmuch as the regularization of service of contractual employees is undertaken based upon the number of man days put in by them. However, the number of days that they were unauthorizedly absent from duty has to be deducted for the purpose of such computation. Whereas the orders of this Court referred to supra are sought to be understood as if this Court wanted to confer a benefit of continuity of service for the period that followed the date of termination till the date of re-engagement. To my mind, that does not appear to be the intended purpose of the orders passed by this Court. Otherwise, the expressions “except for the period during which they were absent” would not have been chosen by the learned Judges. After all, once the services of a contractual appointee are terminated by the Depot Manager concerned,
till he gets reengaged, either by the appellate or revisional authority, he would remain to be away and absent from service. The main cause behind the very termination of contract of employment by the Depot Manager was due to the unauthorized absence caused by the contractual appointee, resulting in cancellation of bus services, dislocation of work, loss of revenue and most importantly, the hardship caused to the commuting public all due to nonavailability of the contractual appointee for operating certain services. Therefore, it is clearly intended by this Court to confer benefit for the past service rendered prior to the date of termination to be reckoned and computed for the purpose of regularization of their service at a future date. It is not in dispute that regularization of contractual services is undertaken on the strength and basis of the number of man days put in by such contractual appointees. The contractual appointees will be engaged depending upon the quantum of work load that is available and the urgency and necessity to engage their services for such purposes. Therefore, the Court intended to confer the benefit of past service rendered by the contractual appointees minus the number of days they were absent either due to exigencies or unauthorizedly together. Such a measure would stand to reason and logic, inasmuch as for want of requirement of manpower, the services of a contractual appointee would normally be utilized by the Corporation on a continuous basis. In a given situation, there could be gaps in between two spells of such utilization of service. Without in any manner and without unduly bothering about the artificial breaks that are normally conceived and put in place, the past service benefit for the purpose of working out the man days put in should not be lost out. Making a contractual appointee to derive such a benefit does appear to be reasonable and fair. That appears to be the plain meaning or effect which this Court intended to confer.”
I, therefore, dispose of this writ petition also subject to the same terms and conditions contained in the above-referred judgment. This order is passed after considering the submissions made by Sri K.Srinivasa Rao, learned Standing Counsel for APSRTC. No costs.
The Miscellaneous Petitions, if any, pending in this writ petition shall stand closed.
NOOTY RAMAMOHANA RAO, J
Date: 02-04-2013 Prv
THE HON'BLE SRI JUSTICE NOOTY RAMAMOHANA RAO
WRIT PETITION No.9649 of 2013
Dated 02-04-2013
Colour shows how this judgement treated each authority
MD.Gulam Mohammed v. Regional Manager, APSRTCFollowed¶4
MD.GULAM MOHAMMED Vs. REGIONAL MANAGER, APSRTC, HYDERABAD AND OTHERS, 2013 (1) ALD 501
Petitioner (unnamed)
APSRTC
Nooty Ramamohana Rao
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
