WP(C) 8321/2001 BEFORE THE HON’BLE MRS JUSTICE ANIMA HAZARIKA JUDGMENT AND ORDER (ORAL) By filing the instant writ petition, the petitioners have challenged the Office order dated 29.09.2001, thereby fixing the inter se seniority of the per sons in the rank of Senior Assistant and praying for setting aside the same and also for a direction to the respondent authority to rectify the seniority positi on of the petitioners in the impugned seniority list of Senior Assistants, ASEB 2. The petitioners’ case in a nutshell is narrated hereinbelow:- The petitioners numbering two, were appointed as Junior Assistants in the Assam State Electricity Board (hereinafter referred to as the Board ) on 16.2.1977 an d 17.1.1977 respectively. According to the petitioners there is no rules and reg ulations framed by the Board governing the promotion of Junior Assistants to the next higher post of Senior Assistants, but the same is regulated by the various office orders issued by the Board from time to time. On 27.09.1979 the Secretar y of the Board issued an office order vide No. ASEB(PL) 155/77/7 laying down pro cedure to be followed for promotion from the post of Junior Assistants to Senior Assistants which is quoted herein below :- OFFICE OF THE CHAIRMAN ASSAM STATE ELECTRICITY BOARD ; NARANGI; GUWAHATI-26. No. ASEB(PL)155/77/7 Dated Narengi the 27th Sept. 1979. OFFICE ORDER The pre-requisite under the existing practice in regard to consideration for pro moting a Junior Assistant in Board’s Head Quarter office is that he must pass a qualifying examination conducted departmentally. It has not been defined how man y chances he may avail himself of in passing it. Irrespective of the time taken to pass it, a junior Assistant is allowed to retain his seniority(assigned to hi m in the orders of Junior Assistant) in the higher rank also although many of hi s juniors may have passed it earlier to him. In order to remedy this state of affairs it has been decided that following prin ciples should regulate the assignment of seniority to a junior Assistant on his promotion to the rank of Senior Assistant henceforwarded :- 1. A regularly recruited Junior Asstt. Should be eligible to take the quali fying examination after completion of 2 years of service as such. 2. For retaining inter-se seniority on promotion as obtained in the rank of Junior Asstt. he must qualify in the qualifying examination within consecutive 4 chances. 3. In case he fails to qualify in any of the said chances, he will take his seniority on promotion after passing the qualifying test along with Jr. Asstt. passing in the same test. Provided, however, that his seniority position will be placed above that of his juniors who passed in the same test. With a view to removing hardship to any Junior Asstt. who has already exhausted all the four chance or who has only one chance left to qualify in the qualifying examination, it is decided to allow such a Junior Asstt. two more consecutive chances to qualify from the date of this order. Any Jr. Assistant falling in thi s category will on passing the test and on promotion to the post of Sr. Assistan t be allowed to retain the same seniority position (as obtained by him as Jr. As stt.). This is purely a transitory provisions and shall be deemed to have been r evoked after the above two qualifying test are completed. Sd/- K.K. Bhattacharjee, Secretary, ASSAM. Subsequently, the qualifying examination was conducted by the Board for promotio n of Junior Assistant to the post of Senior Assistant in the year 1981, 1983, 19 84 and 1985. The petitioner No. 1 qualified for its promotion to the post of Sen ior Assistant in third chance and was accordingly promoted to the post of Senior Assistant on 12.01.1984. Similarly the petitioner No. 2 qualified in its fourth chance and was promoted to the post of Senior Assistant on 7.06.1985. Since the petitioners have qualified within the stipulated period, they retained the inte r se seniority in the next higher post as per terms of the above office order da ted 27.09.1979. Although the respondent Nos. 4 to 11 qualified in the year 1981 they remained Junior to the petitioners as they were Junior in the post of Junio r Assistants. On 28.07.1986 the Respondent Board published a provisional seniority list of Sen ior Assistants wherein the petitioner No. 1 was placed at serial No. 23 and peti tioner No. 2 was placed at serial No. 21. So far the private respondents are con cerned they were placed below the petitioners in the said seniority list. It was further mentioned therein that representations from the affected persons, if an y, will be duly considered if the same is received within 15 days from the date of issue of the order. Thereafter, on 10.09.1986 the respondent No. 4 submitted a representation to the respondent No. 3 Secretary of the Board, with a request to re-fix his seniority from the date of his promotion to the post of Senior Ass istant on the ground amongst others that he had qualified earlier than the writ petitioners and other persons who could not qualify along with him in the qualif ying examination. The respondent Board in supersession of the office order dated 27.09.1979 issued another office order No. ASEB (PL) 153/77/132 dated 7.08.1987 laying down the p rocedure for promotion and seniority of Junior Assistants. Clause 3 of the said office order stipulates as follows :- Seniority of Jr. Asstts. on their promotion to the post of Senior Asstt. will h ence forth be determined batchwise in the point of time without disturbing the s eniority inter se of the qualified candidates in the same batch. These orders sh all be effective in all qualifying examinations for Jr. Asstt. that will be held hereafter. Jr. Asstts. who have passed in qualifying examination before will be governed by the orders already in force i.e. No. ASEB/PL/153/77/7 dtd 27.9.79. The petitioners’ further case is that the respondent Board had finalized the pro visional seniority list of 37 employees in the rank of Senior Assistants and a f inal seniority list of Senior Assistant was published vide office order No. ASEB (CON) 2/73/182 dated 11.09.1987 wherein the names of the petitioner Nos. 1 and 2 were placed at serial No. 23 and 21 respectively and the private respondents w ere placed as follows :- Respondent No. 4 Sl No. 36 Respondent No. 5 Sl No. 28 Respondent No. 6 Sl No. 22 Respondent No. 7 Sl No. 33 Respondent No. 8 Sl No. 26 Respondent No. 9 Sl No. 31 Respondent No. 10 Sl No. 35 Respondent No. 11 Sl No. 29 3. Subsequently, the respondent No. 4 to 11 along with other similarly situ ated persons challenged the seniority list dated 11.09.1987 as well as Office Or ders dated 27.09.1979 and 7.08.1987 before this Court vide Civil Rule No. 1164/8 8. According to the petitioners although they were impleaded as party respondent s in the said case, they did not appear in the said case on the assurance of the Law officer of the Board who assured them that the Board would defend the case on behalf of all respondents through Board’s legal retainer vide letter dated 7. 11.1988 issued by the Law officer. This Court vide its judgment and order dated 31.08.1993 quashed the last paragraph of Office Order dated 27.09.1979 and also the last paragraph of the Office Order dated 7.08.1987. Consequently, the office order dated 11.09.1987 was also set aside by this Court with a further directio n to the respondent Board to rearrange the seniority of the petitioners therein in accordance with the criteria laid down in paragraph 3 of the office order dat ed 7.08.1987. Pursuant to the said judgment, the respondent Board vide office or der No. ASEB (PL) 4/94/178 dated 29.09.2001 published the inter se seniority of the petitioners and others by which the position of the writ petitioner No. 1 ha s gone down to serial No. 31 and the petitioner No. 2 has gone down to serial No . 34 respectively whereas in the earlier select list their positions were at ser ial Nos. 23 & 24 respectively. 4. Being aggrieved, the present writ petition has been filed challenging th e abovementioned office order dated 29.09.2001 praying for setting aside the sam e and also for a direction to the respondents to rectify the seniority positions of the petitioners accordingly. In the said writ petition, the respondent Nos. 1, 2 and 3 jointly submitted their counter affidavit. Similarly, the private res pondents i.e. respondent Nos. 4 to 11 also submitted their affidavit-in-oppositi on jointly. 5. Heard Mr. A Dasgupta, learned counsel appearing for the writ petitioners . Also heard Mr. D Bhattacharjee, learned counsel for the respondent Nos. 1, 2 a nd 3 and Mr. G. C. Phukan, learned counsel on behalf of respondent Nos. 4 to 11. I have gone through the pleadings made in the writ petition, affidavit-in-oppos ition filed by the respondents and also perused the records of the case produced by the learned counsel for the respondent Board. 6. The only question involved in the present case is whether the impugned o rder dated 29.09.2001 issued by the Respondent Board warrants interference by th is Court and to decide this question, it is very much necessary to go through th e earlier judgment dated 31.03.1993 (supra) passed by this Court. By the said ju dgment, this Court had set aside and quashed the last paragraph of office order dated 27.09.1979 as well as the last paragraph of order dated 7.08.1987 and issu ed a further direction to the respondent Board to rearrange the seniority of the petitioners therein i.e. the respondent Nos. 4 to 11 in the present writ petiti on in accordance with the criteria laid down in paragraph 3 of the office order dated 7.08.1987. It is pursuant to the said directions, the present impugned ord er dated 29.09.2001 has been issued by the respondent Board, which is under chal lenge in the present writ petition. 7. Further, it may also be noted herein that in paragraph 3 of the writ pet ition it has been stated by the petitioners that the petitioner No. 1 was appoin ted on 16.2.1977 and the petitioner No. 2 was appointed on 17.01.1977 as Junior Assistants under the Respondent Board. The Respondent Nos. 4 to 11 also entered into Board’s service as Junior Assistants but they are junior to the writ petiti oners whose dates of joining has been mentioned in the said paragraph of the wri t petition. However, upon the perusal of the statements made in the said paragra ph, I find that Respondent No. 6 joined on 11.1.1977 and the Respondent No. 8 jo ined on 10.01.1977 as Junior Assistants under the respondent Board earlier than the writ petitioners. Hence, it is not understood as to how they are junior to t he writ petitioners in the rank of Junior Assistants. The Respondent Nos. 4 to 1 1 in their affidavit have denied that the petitioners are senior to all the resp ondents at the grade of Junior Assistants and have also stated that the responde nt Nos. 6 & 8 were senior to the writ petitioner on the basis of entry into the service under the Board. 8. Now, so far the judgment dated 31.08.1993 passed by this Court in Civil Rule No. 1164/88 is concerned, the said judgment has not been challenged by any aggrieved person, especially the present writ petitioners who were party respond ents in the said writ petition nor any review petition has been filed for review of the aforesaid judgment although they were very much aware about the proceedi ngs of the aforesaid Civil Rule. Accordingly, the said judgment has attained its finality. So far the impugned office order dated 29.09.2001 is concerned, the s ame has been issued in compliance of the direction contained in the aforesaid ju dgment dated 31.08.1993. Hence, the petitioners are estopped from challenging th e office order dated 29.09.2001. 9. In view of the aforesaid facts, this Court is not inclined to interfere with the order dated 29.09.2001 issued by the Respondent Board. Consequently, th e writ petition stands dismissed. 10. No order as to costs.