IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA
CWJC No.5925 of 2006
UDAY KUMAR MEHTA s/o Sri Manik Chand Mehta, resident of
Mohalla- Shastri Nagar Ahari, Post Office & P.S. Aurangabad,
District- Aurangabad.
Versus
1. THE STATE OF BIHAR .
2. Secretary, Urban Development Department, Bihar, Patna.
3.Secretary, Road Construction Department, Bihar, Patna.
4. The Vice Chairman, Patna Regional Development Department,
Maurya Lok, Patna.
5. Engineer-in-Chief, Road Construction Department, Bihar,
Patna.
6. Executive Engineer, Road Construction Department, Division
no.1, Aurangabad.
7. Secretary, Patna Regional Development Authority, Maurya Lok,
Patna.
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For the Petitioner : Mr.Shambhu Sharan Singh
For the State : Mr. Arjun Pd. Singh
For P.R.D.A. : Mr. Shekhar Singh
3 7.12.2010 The petitioner was a Junior Engineer under the Road
Construction Department of Govt. of Bihar. By order of
Engineer-in-Chief, his services were transferred to Patna
Regional Development Authority by letter dated 24.11.2004. It
is not in dispute that the petitioner approached the officers of
Patna Regional Development Authority to accept his joining
which was not accepted as they had not received any formal
communication thereof. Thus, the petitioner having been asked
to join , could not join because of communication gap between
the two departments. Ultimately, the Urban Development
Department issued letter dated 21.3.2005 to Patna Regional
Development Authority to accept petitioner’s joining.
Thereafter, the petitioner was permitted to join but accepted in
Jharkhand State. Petitioner has thus filed this writ petition for
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salary for the period 23.12.2004 to 15.4.2005.
A counter affidavit has been filed in which these basic
facts are not in dispute. All I can say that the petitioner would be
treated as waiting for posting and as such till his services are not
regularized, no payment can be made. To my mind this is
clearly arbitrary and cannot be sustained. The petitioner was
transferred by order of the Engineer-in-Chief. There is no
dispute that he was not allowed to join because the department
(PRDA) in which he has to join did not receive communication
in time. Thus, there is no fault on the part of the petitioner in
any manner. The responsibility lies with the authority, who
transferred a person but failed to ensure compliance of his
direction .
In that view of the matter I have no option but to allow
this writ application with a direction to Secretary, Urban
Development Department, Bihar, Patna to which petitioner’s
services were transferred to ensure payment of full remuneration
to the petitioner for the period under consideration, as noted
above, which should be made within three months from the date
of production of a copy of this order before the Secretary, Urban
Development Department, Bihar ,Patna.
Singh ( Navaniti Prasad Singh, J.)