High Court
Case Details
WP(C) 1920/2012 BEFORE HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE N. CHAUDHURY Heard Mr. N.K. Baruah, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. N. Deka, advoc ate appearing on behalf of the Life Insurance Corporation of India Limited.
Legal Reasoning
By this application under Article 226 of the Constitutio n of India, the petitioner has challenged the action of the respondent Corporati on in not inviting the petitioner to appear in the limited eligibility test. It is stated that recruitment to the post of Grade-IV, in Divisional Office of the LICI at Bongaigaon, was conducted pursuant to the circular dated 19.05.2011, iss ued by the LICI to all its Zonal Managers. The aforesaid circular dated 19.05.20 11 was necessitated owing to direction of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Shri D.V. Anil Kumar & Ors. Vs LIC of India in Civil Appeal Nos. 953-968/2005 . In the said judgment the Hon’ble Supreme Court had been pleased to issue a dir ection to the Corporation to hold a limited written examination and interview fo r temporary Class-IV employees who were working in LICI for more than 5 years as on 18.01.2011 and to regularize their service who had possessed the minimum eli gible educational qualification and age as prescribed at the relevant time of en try to the LICI. It was further provided in the said circular that those who wou ld be recruited should not be entitled any other benefit of past service.
Decision
Pursuant to the aforesaid guideline dated 19.05.2011 issued by t he LICI, the authority in the office of Divisional Manager, LICI at Bongaigaon a lso issued an advertisement, and interview was also held by the Divisional Offic e of Bongaigaon pursuant to the advertisement issued by the central office of th e LICI. The last date for submission of application was 03.06.2011. The petition er who claims to have been in service since 15.03.1998 as temporary employee al so submitted his application and paid a sum of Rs. 250/- as examination fee. But he was not called to appear before the written test. In paragraph 4 of the writ petition, the petitioner has claimed that he joined service under the Corporati on on 15.03.1998 and that he was serving with utmost sincerity and diligently to the satisfaction of the authority without any blemish. Without saying specifica lly in the writ petition that he was working since 18.01.2011, the writ petition er claimed that as on the cut off date he had completed five years of service. By filing an affidavit-in-opposition against the writ petition on 07.11.2012, Th e Assistant Secretary (Legal) N.E. Cell, Guwahati stated that the writ petitione r was working in the respondent Corporation from 15.03.1998 to 16.03.2010 i.e., as on the effective date of 18.01.2011 he was no longer in service, which, acc ording to the deponent, is mandatory requirement of the advertisement dated 20.0 5.2011 referred to above. In paragraph 7 of the affidavit-in-opposition, the sam e statement has been reiterated by showing that since 17.03.2010, the writ petit ioner is no longer in the service of the Corporation and, as such, he was not el igible in terms of the advertisement. The writ petitioner has filed an affidavit-in-reply as a gainst the aforesaid affidavit-in-opposition of the Corporation. In paragraph 5 of the said affidavit, it is stated that as on 18.01.2011, the deponent was serv ing on daily wage basis in the office of the LICI, Bongaigaon Branch, under the Senior Branch Manager and Assistant Branch Manager LICI, Bongaigaon Branch. In t he said paragraph it is stated that accordingly certificates were issued to him by the Branch Manager. Mr. N. Deka, learned advocate representing the Corporati on, has drawn my attention to Annexure-B series basing on which the writ petitio ner claimed to have been in service as on 18.01.2011. The said certificate is at page 18 of the writ petition and it contains the following recital. (cid:28)This is to certify that Shri Gunajit Das, S/O. Late Romesh Das, an inhabitant of Vill- Deuripara, Purani BOngaigaon, Dist. Bongaigaon, Assam ha d been working as daily wager since 15.03.1998 to 16.03.2010 in LIC of India, Bo ngaigaon Branch Office he was rendering temporary service in our office for more than five years as on 18.01.2011 very sincerely (cid:29) Showing this recital in the certificate, Mr. Deka submits that from the certificate annexed by the writ petitioner himself, it is clear that th e last date of service rendered by the petitioner was on 16.03.2010 and it start ed since 15.03.1998. The writ petitioner could not show any other document to es tablish that he had been in service on 18.01.2011. From the Annexure-C, the let ter dated 19.05.2011, it appears that the eligibility criteria for being consid ered in the aforesaid recruitment of Grade-IV is that he should be temporary em ployee as on 18.01.2011 and must have completed 5 years of service. Learned counsel for the petitioner on the other hand sub mits that the said requirement should be read a completion of 5 years service as on 18.01.2011. The learned counsel for the petitioner wants this Court to hold that whether or not an employee was in service on 18.01.2011 but if he had comp leted five years of service prior to the said date he should be considered to el igible in terms of the advertisement. The learned standing counsel of the LICI d oes not accept this interpretation. The language used in the circular dated 19.0 5.2011 is quoted below:- hold the limited written examination and interview for this two temporary class - IV employees who are working in LICI for more than five years of service as on (cid:28) &.Hon’ble Supreme Court has directed the corporation to 18.01.2011 &. (cid:29) From bare perusal of the aforesaid sentence it appears that ther e are two conditions to be satisfied under the circular. First, the concerned pe rson should be temporary Class-IV employee and secondly, he should be completed five years of service as on 18.01.2011. Obviously, temporary Class-IV employee must be on 18.01.2011, the employees who are working in the LICI and as such the re is no scope to cast any doubt as to the interpretation of the Corporation tha t the circular is made only for in service temporary employees and not for those employees who had ceased to be in service prior to 18.01.2011, although they ha d completed five years of service. At the same time, it should be kept on record that the same corporation accepted application from the petitioner, received a sum of Rs. 250/- as interview fee and did not return the same. It is stated in t he Bar that as many as 4 vacancies are still in existence in the Divisional Offi ce at Bongaigaon. If that be the case, the authority of LICI shall consider the candidature of the petitioner for any of those posts provided the selection proc ess is undertaken. With these observations, the writ petition is disposed of.