CWP No.1023 of 1989 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.1023 of 1989 Date of Decision:- March 15, 2010 Deepak Malhotra ...Petitioner Versus Chief Engineer, Guru Nank Dev Thermal Plan, PSEB and others ...Respondents Present: Mr.Ashok Gupta, Advocate for the petitioner. None for the respondents ***** CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K.KANNAN 1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? No 2. To be referred to the Reporters or not? No 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? No ***** K.KANNAN, J. (ORAL) 1. The petitioner challenges the seniority list, which was issued on 19.5.1987 for the post of Shift Chemist. The petitioner had been directly appointed having been favoured with an offer of appointment on 25.2.1984, but joined after being relieved from his previous employer at Panipat on 14.3.1984. 2. The grievance of the petitioner against the seniority list was that persons at serial number 1 to 8, had all been promotees and the petitioner having been appointed against the quota reserved for direct appointment, must have been placed above them. 3. The seniority list itself gives particulars of fact of the respective CWP No.1023 of 1989 -2- dates on which the persons who had been shown as seniors to the petitioner had come on promotion. All the persons in serial number 1 to 7 have come to promotional post between the date 14.2.1984 to 17.2.1984, while the person 8th in the seniority list came on promotional post on 28.2.1984. On the face of it, therefore, all the persons in serial number 1 to 8 had joined the post as Shift Chemist on dates earlier to the date when the petitioner joined the service. It appears that the petitioner had made representations on 15.7.1988 and 16.9.1988 but when the writ petition was filed, the contention of the respondent was that the petitioner had rushed to court with the writ petition, even without waiting for their response to the representations given by the petitioner. 4. At this length of time, it shall not be possible to direct the respondents to consider the representations. If the issue had to be considered in the context of a quota for the reserved post, even then, if he had joined, as a matter of fact, on a date subsequent to the date when the promotees had assumed office, no legal error could be seen to have been committed by the respondents in showing persons in serial number 1 to 8, as seniors above the petitioner. 5. In my view, the petitioner cannot have any remedy for challenging the seniority list and accordingly, this writ petition is dismissed. There shall however be no direction as to costs. March 15, 2010 (K.KANNAN) Vt JUDGE