Employee Should Not Be Deprived Of Benefits Due To Error Committed By Employer/State: Allahabad HC Sets Aside Orders Rejecting Teachers' Plea For Regularization
The Allahabad High Court stated that an employee should not be deprived of any benefit or the provisions of law only because an employer/State had committed an error.
The Lucknow Bench quashed the impugned orders passed by the Regional Level Committee (RLCs) that had rejected the regularisation of teachers in management colleges under Section 33-G of the Uttar Pradesh Secondary Education (Service Selection Boards) Act, 1982 (the Act) without relying on their appointment letters.
A Single Bench of Justice Shree Prakash Singh observed, “It is worth to notice that the provisions contained under section 33- G of the Act 1982, is a beneficiary scheme launched by the State Government looking into the plight of the teachers who were serving for more than two decades and their service conditions were not regulated as there was no statutory provisions. It has long been held that in our constitutional scheme, the State is a welfare State and action of State must transpire that decision taken by the State be fair, reasonable, transparent and justifiable.”
Advocate Harsha Yadav represented the petitioner, while CSC Shailendra Kumar Singh appeared for the respondents.
The petitioners were appointed either under the Second Removal of Difficulties Order framed under Act No. 5 of 1982 or under the unamended Section 18 of the Uttar Pradesh Secondary Education (Service Selection Boards) Act, 1982. Subsequently, with the insertion of a new Section 33-G by UP Act No. 7 of 2016, effective from 22.3.2016, it became incumbent upon the RLC to thoroughly examine the petitioners' case.
The petitioners contended that the RLCs had failed to properly examine their cases in accordance with the applicable legal provisions. Since the opportunity of personal hearing to the concerned affected teachers had also not been accorded, the Court found the same to not comply with the rules of principles of natural justice.
“The matter, which is in hand to decide, is not on the premises that there is no regularisation rules prevailing but petitioners have been deprived of their valuable rights without ensuring the due opportunity of hearing and further prior coming to the conclusion, the records were not procured from the committee of management as well as the District Inspector of Schools concerned,” the Bench remarked.
The Court found that the RLCs had not ensured the availability of appointment records from the management committees of the institutions and the District Inspectors of Schools before making their decision in a “cyclostyle” manner.
The Court noted that “the orders impugned in all the writ petitions have been passed in a cyclostyle manner and without ensuring the records from the committee of management and the District Inspector of Schools and, therefore, those assail infirmity and erroneousness.”
Consequently, the Court relegated the matter back to the RLCs concerned to pass a fresh order within three months while directing strict adherence to the scheme provided under Section 33-G of the Act.
“An employee should not be deprived of any benefit or the provisions of law only because of the fact that some error has been committed by the employer including the State and if it is so, the same must be rectified. So far as the present petitioners are concerned, their appointments were made under certain exigencies and the grave requirements for imparting education, wherein the State machinery was totally failed to make appointment of teachers, which is the paramount duty of a welfare State,” the Bench added.
Accordingly, the High Court allowed the petition.
Cause Title: Tirthraj v. State of U.P. & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2024:AHC-LKO:36779)
Appearance:
Petitioner: Advocate Harsha Yadav
Respondents: CSC Shailendra Kumar Singh; ACSC Vivek Shukla