SRINAGAR Jammu and Kashmir High Court has pulled the government, observing that it pains one to see that the persons, holding the posts of Junior Engineers on substantive basis, are placed as Incharge Assistant Engineers without adhering to the rules and the law evolved on the subject.
The Supreme Court has not only deprecated this practice but has also directed the State of J&K to ensure that such an exercise should be carried into effect only after seeking clearance from the PSC/DPC, a bench of Justice M K Hanjura said.
Such arrangements give the employees the fodder and grub to knock at the portals of the Court and enter into unnecessary litigations that could have been avoided.
The court directed the government to make every endeavor to see that the directions of the Supreme Court, extended in Suraj Prakash Guptas case, are complied with in their letter and spirit and the promotion to the post of the Assistant Engineers is made in accordance with the law and the rules governing the field.
The Court dismissed the writ petitioners filed by a number of engineers, appointed as Junior Engineers in the respondent department in the year 2009 and were placed as Incharge Assistant Engineers in terms of various orders passed in the light of the Cabinet Decision No. 128/2014 dated 16-07-2014, having the effect of creating 177 posts of Assistant Engineers in the Rural Development Department. It was stated that the last seniority list of Junior Engineers (Civil) was updated in the year 1996, which was notified vide Govt. order No. 225-PW(R&B) of 2012 dated 11-05-2012. However, the respondents issued the Govt. order No. 319-PW(R&B) of 2015 dated 01-12-2015 & order No. 321-PW(R&B) of 2015 dated 01-12-2015, by the dint of which, the placement of the petitioners has been revoked and rescinded and the orders of their placement came to be cancelled as they were found junior to the private respondents and therefore, not entitled to be placed as Incharge Assistant Engineers. It was stated that the decision to cancel the placement of the petitioners was taken after one of the Junior Engineers, namely Danish Iqbal filed a writ petition (SWP 2298/2014), challenging the promotion of the petitioners. In the writ petition, the Court passed an interim direction directing the respondents to consider the claim of the petitioner therein. It was further stated that the respondents issued the impugned order No. 321-PW(R&B) of 2015 dated 01-12-2015, promoting one Danish Iqbal, the petitioner in SWP 2298/2014, along with eleven others as Assistant Engineers.
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