Megh Singh and Others vs State of H.P. and Others

Surjit Singh, J.—Heard and gone through the record.

Petitioners were engaged as daily waged workers by respondent No. 2 in the year 1983 and 1987. One of them, namely, Megh Singh, petitioner No. 1 was engaged in the year 1983 and other two in the year 1987. Their services were terminated in the year 1994. They challenged their termination by filing a writ petition in this Court, being Civil Writ Petition No. 720 of 1994. That writ petition was disposed of with the following direction:

The respondents are directed to engage the petitioners a daily wage Beldar as soon as they report to them and they will not be dis-engaged/retrenched so long work and finances are available with the respondents. They are further directed that the petitioners will be dis-engaged/retrenched in accordance with law and by following the principle of last come first go for which they will maintain seniority i.e. range-wise and thereafter division-wise. The petitioners will be given benefit of their past service for the purpose of seniority. The petitioners may report the Divisional Forest Officer, Karsog Forest Division Mandi within a period of 15 days.

The writ petition is disposed of in these terms.

Pursuant to the aforesaid order of this Court, copy Annexure P-1, petitioners were re-engaged. Thereafter, they filed an original application before the State Administrative Tribunal seeking conferment of work charge status. The Tribunal, vide order dated 24.7.2007, copy Annexure P-4, directed that they be conferred work charge status, w.e.f. 1.4.2004. Though from the relief clause it cannot be made out what relief the petitioners are looking for in this petition, from an overall reading of the petition it appears that they claim regularization of service on completion of ten years services, from the year of their original engagement, i.e. 1983 in the case of petitioner No. 1 and 1987 in the case of petitioners No. 2 and 3.

Respondents have contested the petition and it is stated that petitioners have been in continuous service with 240 mandays in every calendar year, only from January 1994 and therefore, they are not entitled to be regularized by counting their services from 1983 in the case of petitioner No. 1 and 1987 in the case of other two writ petitioners.

Mandays charts have been placed on record, both by the petitioners and the respondents. Chart placed by the petitioners is Annexure P-2 and the one placed by the respondents is Annexure R-1. Both the charts show that the petitioners have been in continuous service with 240 mandays every year only from 1994 in the case of petitioner No. 1 and from 1995 in the case of other two petitioners. They have already been directed to be given work charge status by the Tribunal from 2004 vide order Annexure P-4.

In view of the above state position, the writ petition is disposed of with a direction to the respondents to consider the case of the petitioners for regularization of their services on completion of ten years service commencing from 1.1.1994 in the case of petitioner No. 1 and 1.1.1995 in the case of other two petitioners in accordance with the scheme of 1994 as amended from time to time, as also the directions of the Supreme Court in the case of Mool Raj Upadhyaya Vs. State of H.P. and Others,