Bhupinder Kumar vs State of H.P. and others

Surjit Singh, Judge

Heard and gone through the record.

Petitioner was appointed as Forest Guard in Indo German Dhauladar Project, in the year 1982. When the project completed and services of the petitioner became surplus, he was appointed as Forest Guard in the Forest Department of the State of Himachal Pradesh. His pay was protected and also, it appears, he had been assigned seniority in the cadre of Forest Guards of the State, counting his service in the aforesaid Project. Seniority List, copy Annexure A-II, was circulated. Thereafter, without serving any notice upon the petitioner or affording an opportunity of being heard to him, on the basis of representations made by some Forest Guards of the Department, petitioner''s seniority was disturbed. It was re-fixed, vide Annexure A-1, by excluding the period of his service rendered by him in the Project. Petitioner sought quashing of Annexure A-1, by means of present petition, which was filed as Original Application before the erstwhile H.P. State Administrative Tribunal in the year 2004 and is now registered as the present Civil Writ Petition (T) No. 11476/2008, with this Court, after it came to this Court, on abolition of the said Tribunal.

Respondents, in their reply, have stated that on representations, received from some Forest Guards of the Department, petitioner was shown as junior to the Forest Guards, who had been appointed in the Forest Department, before services of the petitioner were taken over by it (Forest Department), on completion of the work of aforesaid Project.

It is submitted on behalf of the petitioner that without affording an opportunity of being heard to the petitioner, impugned action of change in seniority, vide Annexure A-1, could not have been taken by the respondents. I find substance in the submission. When the petitioner had been shown as appointee in the Forest Department from 1982, considering the period of his service in the Project as the period of service in the Forest Department and his name figured in seniority list on the assumption that he was an employee of the Forest Department since 1982, impugned order Annexure A-1, showing him as an employee of the Forest Department from 1989, when on the winding up of aforesaid Project his services were taken over by the Forest Department, could not have been passed without affording him an opportunity to represent against the proposed action.

Consequently, impugned Annexure A-1, which is in the nature of a corrigendum to the seniority list (Annexure A-2), is quashed. However, the respondent will be free to pass appropriate orders in the matter, after affording an opportunity of being heard/making representation, to the petitioner.

Disposed of.