{ 1 } IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE FOR RAJASTHAN AT JODHPUR J U D G M E N T D.B. CIVIL SPL. APPEAL (WRIT) NO.611/2010 ITI LTD. & ORS. VS. SHAMBHU NATH TRIGUN & ANR. Date of Judgment : 09.12.2010 PRESENT HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE A.M.SAPRE HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE KAILASH CHANDRA JOSHI Mr. N.S. Acharya, for the appellants. Mr. A.K. Rajvanshy, for the respondents. BY THE COURT: (PER HON'BLE A.M. SAPRE, J) The decision rendered in this appeal shall govern disposal of other appeals being DBSAW Nos.157/2009, 183/2009, 184/2009, 185/2009, 247/2009, 612/2010 and 613/2010 because firstly all these appeals are between the same parties, secondly they arise out of common order passed by the Single Judge, and lastly all appeals involve identical points for consideration. 2. This is an intra court appeal filed by the writ petitioner of W.P.No. 3014 of 2008 under Rule 134 of Rajasthan High court Rules against an order dt. 19.08.2010 passed by Single Judge in aforementioned writ petition. 3. By impugned order, the learned Single Judge disposed of the writ petition with directions to the appellants (who are respondents in the writ petition ) to consider the case of the writ petitioners and to grant them regular pay scale of the post held by them. { 2 } 4. So the questions that arise for consideration in this intra court appeal is whether learned Single Judge was justified in issuing the two directions? 5. Facts of the case lie in a narrow compass. They, however, need mention infra to appreciate the controversy involved in the writ petition out of which intra court appeal arise and now involved in this appeal. 6. The appellant No.1 is a Government of India Company. The respondent No.1 is claiming to be in the employment of appellant – company since 1986 and working on different post filed a writ petition out of which this intra court appeal arises against the appellants. He claimed a relief that he be regularized in the appellant’s services and be given a regular pay scale of the post on which he has been working. Like wise, other respondent of connected appeals, filed the writ petitions out of which connected appeals arise claiming the same relief of their regularization and fixation of pay scale of the post held by them in the appellant’s services. According to them, the very fact that writ petitioners have been working on different posts since last more then two decades regularly, in appellant’s set up gives them a right to claim the benefit of regularization and proper pay fixation. The appellant (as respondent in the writ petition) denied the claim of writ petitioners on factual as also on legal grounds. We do not consider it necessary to set out in details of the grounds taken by the appellant in their return because the learned Single Judge did not decide the writ petition on the contentious issues raised by the parties. 7. By impugned order, the learned Single Judge partly allowed the writ petition and passed following directions against the appellants: { 3 } “In view of the above reasons, the writ petitions are allowed in terms of the judgment delivered in the case of Ganpat Lal Parjapat's case (supra) and the respondents are directed to consider the case of the petitioners in the light of directions issued by the Supreme Court in the case of Uma Devi (supra) for regularization on the posts appropriate to job of the petitioners in these writ petitions upon which they were initially appointed and allowed to work and respondents are further directed to grant regular pay scale of the post to the petitioners.” 8. It is against these directions, the respondents of writ petition have felt aggrieved and filed this intra court appeal. 9. Submission of learned counsel for the appellants was essentially two fold. In the first place, he contended that writ court was in error in entertaining the writ petition and in any event erred in issuing the impugned directions. According to him, reading the decision Uma Devi relied upon by the learned Single Judge in the context of facts set out by the appellant in their return, it is clear that not only the impugned directions were unsustainable but even the writ petition was liable to be dismissed at its threshold in limini. His second submission was that assuming that the writ petition was rightly entertained yet the impugned directions and in particular the last one are contrary in them. It was pointed out that when the appellants issued directions to consider the cases of writ petitioners then simultaneous to such directions, no consequential directions could have been given to give them a particular regular pay scale. Such direction according to learned counsel was liable to be set aside as being contrary to the first one. { 4 } 10. In reply, the learned counsel supported the impugned directions and prayed for dismissal of appeal. 11. Having heard the learned counsel for the parties and on perusal of the record of the case, we are inclined to allow the appeal in part and in consequence, while upholding one direction issued by the writ court set aside the other as indicated infra. 12. Coming first to the submission urged by learned counsel for the appellant, we find no merit in the same. It was not in dispute that the appellant was Government of India Company and, thus, was a State within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution of India. It was, therefore, amenable to writ jurisdiction of this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. 13. Coming to the second submission as to whether, in the facts and circumstances of the case, a writ petition was capable of being entertained? In our opinion, it was capable of being entertained. It was for the reason, that writ petitioner was in the employment of the appellant, and hence could take recourse to all such legal remedies as were available to him in law against the appellant for getting his grievance adjudicated qua them. He had the locus to file a case against the appellant. One such remedy though extraordinary in nature was filing of the writ petition under Article 226 ibid. If therefore, the writ court in its discretion, considered proper to entertain the writ petition then we do not find any good ground to hold that the writ court wrongly exercised such discretion. 14. Coming to third submission that keeping in view the controversy and law laid down in Uma Devi’s, no case for entertaining the writ petition much less a case for issuing directions in the form of mandamus to appellant is made out { 5 } has also no merit. In our view, learned Single Judge only issued a mandamus to the appellants to consider the cases of respective writ petitioner with a view to find out as to whether any of the writ petitioners is entitled to get the relief of regularization in their services and if so on what grounds and if not then on what grounds. Like wise, the appellants were directed to examine as to whether any of the writ petitioners is entitled to claim regular pay scale and if so in which pay scale and from which date? Such direction in our opinion did not tantamount to granting the relief itself to the writ petitioner but it only meant consideration of their cases. In compliance to such directions, it will be now for the appellants to examine as to whether any of the writ petitioners is entitled to claim any relief as claimed by him and if so how and on what grounds? 15. A direction of this nature can always be issued by the High Court under Article 226 of the Constitution against the State or its Authority; such as the appellant in this case and hence we find no good ground to set aside such direction. We, thus, uphold this direction issued by the Writ Court. 16. Coming to the last submission, that direction issued by the writ court to grant regular pay scale to writ petitioner is bad in law has merit. It is for the reason, that it tantamount to granting the relief to the writ petitioners even without examining their case on merits. It is also for the reason that such direction was contrary to the earlier direction. In other words, when direction to consider the cases of the writ petitioners was issued, then simultaneous direction to grant the regular pay scale to the writ petitioner could not have been issued because it virtually resulted in nullifying the earlier direction of consideration of the writ petitioner’s case. Indeed, as a result of such directions, there was nothing left { 6 } for the appellants to consider except to grant regular pay scale to the writ petitioner. In our view, therefore, both directions could not stand together being contradictory to each other. 17. There is one more reason as to why the direction to grant regular pay scale is bad. Firstly, the learned Single Judge while issuing such direction did not assign any reasons. Secondly, the direction is vague because it was not mentioned as to from which date it should be given and of which post and pay scale? Such direction was, therefore, incapable of being implemented for want of specific details. 18. In our view, since we have upheld the directions issued by the writ court for consideration of the case of the writ petitioner, and hence the direction issued by the writ court for grant of regular pay scale to the writ petitioner is liable to be set aside. 19. As a consequence of the foregoing discussion, the appeal partly succeeds and is accordingly allowed. The impugned order is set aside to the extent that, the directions contained in last two sentences of the impugned order i.e “and respondents are further directed to grant regular pay scale of the post to the petitioners” are set aside. 20. The appellants are accordingly directed to consider the case of writ petitioner in terms of the directions of the writ court within a period of three months as an outer limit and communicate the decision taken by them to the respective writ petitioner. ( KAILASH CHANDRA JOSHI ),J. ( A. M. SAPRE ),J. /Anil/