Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [1]
IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT
CHANDIGARH
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008
Date of Decision: 18.12.2009
Instructors/Foreman Instructors Association ......Petitioner
Versus
The State of Haryana and another .......Respondents
CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE HEMANT GUPTA.
HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE JORA SINGH
1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the
judgment?
2. To be referred to the Reporters or not?
3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest?
Present: Ms. Deepika Verma, Advocate, for the petitioner.
Shri Gagandeep Singh Wasu, Senior DAG, Haryana,
for the respondents.
HEMANT GUPTA, J. (Oral).
Challenge in the present writ petition is to the amendment
carried out in Appendix 18 of the Punjab Civil Services Rules, Vol.I,
Part-II, whereby, the Principals, Training and Placement Officers,
Workshop Superintendents, Foreman Instructors, Workshop
Instructors, Librarians of Government Polytechnic Institutions in the
State of Haryana, were included in non-vacational staff.
Rule 8.59 of the Punjab Civil Services Rules (for short `the
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [2]
Rules’), deals with the vacation. The orders under the said Rule are
given in Annexure-I. Appendix 18 is a complete list of the Government
Employees serving in vacation departments. The relevant extracts of
the said Rule and Appendix read as under:-
“8.59. Unless the contrary appears from the context
vacation counts as duty and not as leave.A competent authority may specify the
departments or parts of the departments which would
be treated as vacation departments and the conditions
in which a Government employee should be
considered to have availed himself of a vacation.
Note: The orders issued under this rule are given in
the Annexure I to this section.ANNEXURE I
(see Rule 8.59)1. A vacation department is a department, or part
of a department, to which regular vacations are
allowed during which Government employees
serving in the department are permitted to be absent
from duty.2. (i) The following classes of Government
employees serve in vacation department when the
conditions of paragraph 1 above are fulfilled:-(a) Educational Officers, other than the
Director of Public Instruction and
inspecting officers, and their establishment.(b) Judicial officers of rank not higher
than that of subordinate judge and their
establishments.(c) Any other class of Government Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [3]employee with a competent authority may
declare to be so serving.
(ii) In case of doubt, a competent authority may
decide whether or not a particular Government
employee is serving in a vacation department.
xx xx xx
Note. 2. – A complete list of Government employees
serving in vacation departments is given in Appendix
18 in part II of this volume.”
APPENDIX 18
[ Referred to in Note 2 of paragraph 2 of Annexure I
to Section I of Chapter VIII ]
List of Government Employees serving in Vacation
Departments
The following is a complete list of Government
employees declared to be serving in vacation
departments:-
I. Judicial `1. Sub-Judges and their establishments
including Sub-Judges employed as
Judges of Small Cause Courts
excluding Process Serving
Establishment actually employed on
work connected with process-serving.
II. (A) Education `1. Principals, Staff, Laboratory
(General) Attendants and establishment of
Government Colleges for boys and
girls excluding Librarians, clerical
staff, Restorers and other class IV
Government employees.
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [4]
`2. Head and staff and Laboratory
Attendants of Government school for
boys and girls excluding clerical staff
and other class IV Government
employees.
(B) Education Principals and staff (excluding
(Technical) and ministerial and class IV employees)
Government of the Government Polytechnic
Engineering Institutions.
Colleges
III Industries Principals and other teaching staff of
Government Foot Wear Institute,
Rewari.
IV Health Principals, Professors, Associate
Professors, Readers, Assistant
Professors, Lecturers and Junior
Lecturers in Pharmacy Department.
By Notification Annexure P.3 dated 22.10.2007, the
categories of staff of Government Polytechnics, as mentioned above,
have been excluded from the category of the staff working in the
vacation departments.
For the staff working in vacation departments, vacation
period counts as duty and not as leave as per Rule 8.59 of the Rules. It
is for this reason, the petitioners assert that by excluding certain
categories of staff of the Polytechnics from the list of vacation
departments, they have been unfairly treated and that the amendment of
excluding them is arbitrary and discriminatory.
The ground of challenge is that the similar staff working
with the Engineering Colleges has not been declared as non-vacational
staff and, therefore, the amendment restricted to the staff engaged in
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [5]
the Polytechnic Institutions is arbitrary and discriminatory. It is also
contended that the amendment has been carried out without any
reasonable classification and has no nexus with the object sought to be
achieved, as some of the supervisory staff continues to be vacational
staff.
In the written statement, the State has given the following
reasons necessitating the amendment:-
(i) In addition to teaching work, the Principals of
Polytechnic have been assigned the administrative
duties also, which require continuous attention and
presence of the Principal in institution being Head of
institution.
(ii) Superintendent Workshop is required to arrange
for the procurement and installation of machinery and
equipment in the workshop as per the changing needs
of curriculum for students teaching. The workshop
machinery has also to be kept in working condition.
All these activities require continuous attention and
presence of Superintendent Workshop in the
institution so that the work can easily be handled
during the vacation period.
(iii) The post of Foreman Instructor is a next
supervisory post in the Workshop of Polytechnics
after Superintendent Workshop. The presence of
Foreman Instructors during the vacation period is
essential to arrange the machinery and equipment in
working order and to arrange raw material required
for the training well in time and to assist the
Superintendent Workshop for this work. The
presence of Foreman Instructor is also required to
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [6]
maintain liaison with the industries for the training of
students which is conveniently possible during the
vacation period.
(iv) In three-tier system of the staff structure for
training in Workshops in Polytechnics, the post of
Workshop Instructor is a third important part of the
Workshop staff structure. The post of Workshop
Instructor is required to ensure the availability of
various machinery and equipments required in the
workshops as per the curriculum and to ensure that
the machinery and equipment is in working order.
The post of Workshop Instructor is also required to
arrange the raw material required for the training and
this can be arranged conveniently in vacation so that
study of students may not suffer.
(v) The duties of Head of Department/Senior
Lecturers mainly are teaching and supervisory work
of teaching. During the vacation in the
Polytechnics/Institutes, their presence is not required,
as no teaching work is done during vacation. Rather
Head of Department or Senior Lecturers are not
directly responsible for execution of
repair/maintenance work. Hence, these posts have
been considered as vacational.
(vi) Lecturers are basically responsible for teaching
and the conduct of practical in various laboratories.
The Laboratory Instructors and Laboratory Assistants
assist them in the maintenance and repair of
equipment and hence they have been considered as
vacational staff.”
It is also pointed out that the amendment has been carried
out only for Polytechnics in view of the requirements of
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [7]
Polytechnics/Institutions to provide a better study and training to the
students of Polytechnics running diploma courses. The services of the
staff are required during vacations due to increase intake of students
and for updation of machinery and equipment with the revision of
curriculum and development in technology.
Rule 8.59 of the Rules authorises the competent authority
to specify the departments or part of the departments, which would be
treated as vacation departments. In view of the said Rule, it is required
to be examined whether the decision of the competent authority to treat
certain categories of the employees working in the Polytechnic
institutions as vacational staff is legally justified. The reasons given
are numerous as reproduced above. We do not find that such reasons
have no nexus with the object to be achieved to treat the employees of
the Polytechnics as non-vacational staff. The Polytechnics impart
vocational training to a large number of students at the grass root level
to prepare and engage them in constructive manner in life. Therefore,
to equip the Polytechnics with the necessary machinery and equipment
and to prepare them to meet the intake of students, the amendment in
question cannot be said to be arbitrary. The members of the petitioner-
Union are being paid the salary for the entire year. By treating such
members of the petitioner-Union as vacational staff, the only loss to
them is of some additional vacations. There is no such right with the
members of the petitioner-Union that they must have vacations at par
with the Engineering Colleges. The Engineering Colleges prepare the
Civil Writ Petition No. 283 of 2008 [8]
students for Degree and form a different class. May be with the
passage of time even the Degree Colleges may also be treated as non-
vacational department, but at this moment, treatment of Polytechnics as
vacational staff, cannot be said to be arbitrary and without any
reasonable basis, which classification may warrant interference by this
Court in exercise of its writ jurisdiction.
Hence, the present writ petition is dismissed.
[ HEMANT GUPTA ]
JUDGE
[ JORA SINGH ]
JUDGE
18-12-2009
vimal/ds