Hry govt claims credit on basis of high court order
SAYS WILL REGULARISE SERVICES OF EMPLOYEES WORKING ON ADHOC, WORK-CHARGED AND PARTTIME BASIS FOR 20 TO 25 YEARS
CHANDIGARH: Even as the Haryana government on Wednesday announced to regularise the services of those employees who were working on ad-hoc, work charged and part-time basis for the past 20 to 25 years under the regularisation policies issued in 2003 and 2004, there was a fair amount of ambiguity surrounding the matter.
While an official spokesperson claimed that the government has taken a pro-employee decision, the announcement of regularisation made on Wednesday stemmed from a July 4 order of the Punjab and Haryana high court. Also, it was not made clear by the state government as to how many employees stand to gain from the HC order.
FRESH COURT ORDER
Hearing the petition of Purushotam Das, a Class-4 employee in education department, Justice Ritu Bahri of the high court had said the petitioner had been working as a part-time employee since September 22, 1993. Thereafter, he has been regularised with effect from August 8, 2014. However, some employees, junior to the petitioner have been regularised with effect from September 27, 2003, the HC said.
Justice Bahri ordered that in order to remove the agony of the employees, who are working on ad-hoc, work-charged/part-time etc, for the past more than 20 to 25 years, the state government can consider for creation of a diminishing cadre separately and regularise them immediately so that necessary benefit, after regularisation, can be enjoyed by them.
The HC also made a reference to the government’s regularisation policies of 2003 and 2004 in its July 4 order.
POLICIES RESCINDED, REVIVED, QUASHED
The two policies were rescinded by the government in April 2007 in view of the Supreme Court’s landmark judgment in Uma Devi case. However, the previous government again revived them in June 2014 to appease the employees before the assembly elections. The HC on May 31 quashed all 2014 regularisation policies stating: “In view of our aforesaid discussions, we find that the policies dated June 16,2014, June 18, 2014, July 7, 2014 and July 7, 2014, having been framed in violation of the law laid down by the Supreme Court deserve to be quashed,’’ a HC division bench had ordered.
However, the July 4 HC order of Justice Bahri, which led to Wednesday’s announcement by the state government, cited an apex court judgment saying the state is bound to regularise the services on ground of parity.
“Regularisation should be done on the principle of parity and similar placed employees who have been regularised,’’ Justice Bahri said.