CWP No.17327 of 2011 1 IN THE HIGH COURT FOR THE STATES OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH. Civil Writ Petition No.17327 of 2011 Date of decision: 28.11.2011 Kanchan Singh ...Petitioner Versus State of Punjab & others ...Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE RAJAN GUPTA Present: Mr. Kapil Kakkar, Advocate for the petitioner. Ms. Monica Chhiber Sharma, Dy. Advocate General, Punjab Rajan Gupta, J (oral). Reply on behalf of respondents No.1 & 2 has been filed in court. The same is taken on record. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that case of the petitioner is covered by the judgment delivered by this court in CWP No.5560 of 2011 titled as Jaspal Kaur & ors. vs. State of Punjab & ors. as she is similarly placed as employees in said case. Learned State counsel submits that she has no objection in case the present case is disposed of in same terms as Jaspal Kaur’s case supra. I have heard learned counsel for the parties. Operative part of the order passed in Jaspal Kaur case reads thus:- “It may thus be seen that there was no condition incorporated in the advertisement in that case mandating CWP No.17327 of 2011 2 the candidates to produce their Backward Class Certificates which shouldnot be more than one year old before the cut off date. On the contrary the advertisement in the present case specifically stipulate so and it being sacrosanct, to be uniformly applied to all the candidates, it was obligatory for the petitioners who were seeking benefit of reservations to produce the Certificates strictly in terms thereof. The Government instructions dated 05.12.1996 and 08.01.2010 (Annexures P-10 and P-12) are inapplicable in the context of the issue involved. The instructions merely suggest that if a Certificate has been issued by the competent authority it is imperative upon other Departments to accept and treat it valid for the purpose of admission or employment. These instructions do not deal with the validity period of such a certificate. The second instructions also reiterate that a backward Class Certificate shall continue to be valid till the candidate falls in the 'creamy-layer'. It is for this precise reason that the Department incorporated the condition of one year validity period so as to ascertain that the candidates claiming benefit of reservation for backward class, have not meanwhile fallen to the category of creamylayer. The condition of validity period of one year has to be read into in the government instructions, referred to above. For the reasons recorded aforesaid, I do not find any ground to interfere with the impugned action of the respondents. All the writ petitions are accordingly dismissed. The respondents are, however, directed that in case there is a candidate belonging to the category of dependent of Ex-Serviceman, whose claim falls within the observations/directions issued in Civil Writ Petition No. 7520 of 2011 (Meenakshi Attri V. State of Punjab and CWP No.17327 of 2011 3 others), by a separate order of even date, they shall also be entitled to the similar benefits. It is stated that during the pendency of these writ petitions, the Departmental authorities themselves have considered the similarly placed candidates eligible in the 2nd counselling and they have been asked to produce the Reservation Certificates issued subsequently. If that is so, the petitioners shall also be at liberty to represent to the authorities to treat them at par with similarly placed candidates. Ordered accordingly.” Disposed of in aforesaid terms. At this stage, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that in case any representation is preferred by the petitioner, a decision thereon may be taken expeditiously. Learned State counsel submits that in case of those employees who make representation in terms of aforesaid judgment, decision shall be taken as early as possible. (RAJAN GUPTA) JUDGE November 28, 2011 'rajpal'