Case: State Of Tamilnadu  Vs. M.R. Alagappan

to the contesting respondents. Our attention was then invited by learned counsel for the respondents to a decision of this Court in the case of Jaipal and others v. State of Haryana and others, JT 1988(2) SC 528 : 1988 Supp. 1 SCR 411. In this decision another Division Bench of this Court speaking through K.N. Singh, J. had to consider two identical schemes floated by the State of Haryana with the object of imparting literacy (functional and awareness) to adult illiterates and to provide literacy to children keeping away from schools. Even though the petitioners were discharging the same type of duties as instructors they were being paid a fixed salary of Rs. 200/- per month while under the second scheme, the employees discharging similar duties were offered a running pay scale of Rs. 420-700/-. On facts it was found that there was no difference in the nature of duties of the instructor and squad teachers. Both of them carried out similar work under the same employer and only on the ground that the instructors were part-time employees they could not be offered a fixed salary of Rs. 200/- per month. It becomes at once clear that there was no difference of educational qualifications amongst these twin sets of employees and the only ground on which difference of payment could be justified by the State was that they were employed under a different scheme and were working part-time only for four hours. On these peculiar facts of the case, therefore, it was held that instructors were entitled to same pay scale as sanctioned to squad teachers on the principle of Equal Pay or Equal Work. As the said decision also is rendered in the light of its peculiar facts it is not possible to agree with the learned counsel for the contesting respondents that the ratio of the said decision also gets squarely attracted to the facts of the present case. It is now time for us to take stock of the situation. 18. Keeping in view the aforesaid settled legal position, therefore, it has to be seen whether the Deputy Agricultural Officers and the Agricultural Officers can be said to form an identical class of employees who must be given the same pay scales and denial of which can be said to offend Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. In the light of the well established facts on the record of these cases, to which we have made a reference earlier, it is impossible to hold that the Deputy Agricultural Officers like the contesting respondents are required to be given the same pay scale as Agricultural Officers. Reasons are obvious. They do not form a similar class of employees even though they may be substantially discharging the same type of duties and their place of work may be interchangeable. A glaring difference which results into making them fall in a distinct and separate category of employees deserves to be kept in view. In the first place the contesting respondents are recruited by promotion from the lower category of Assistant Agricultural Officers. On promotion as Deputy Agricultural Officers they remain non- gazetted employees in the subordinate service in the Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Subordinate Service while the Agricultural Officers are directly recruited to a gazetted service called Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Service. The contesting respondents are promoted departmentally while the Agricultural Officers are directly selected through Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission. The minimum educational qualification for being an Agricultural Officer (direct recruit) is B.Sc. (Agriculture) while for a promotee-Deputy Agricultural Officer the minimum educational qualification is SSLC with suitable diploma as laid down by the Rules. Though substantially they carry out the same type of work and duties, important assignments are exclusively entrusted to Agricultural Officers as seen from para 5 of the additional affidavit filed by Shri V. Srinivasan, Deputy Secretary to Government at page 193 of the paper book, as noted earlier. The special duties which can be entrusted only to Agricultural Officers are listed as under : "(a) draw samples of Insecticides(b) draw samples of fertilizers(c) draw seed samples(d) analyse the soil water samples(e) work in the Regional Research Station(f) work in the State Seed Farm(g) work in the Laboratories(h) do soil survey work(i) can be appointed in delta areas. 19. Of course learned counsel for the contesting respondents submitted that in certain circumstances even the task of drawing samples is also being entrusted to Deputy Agricultural Officers. That may be so. But the special quality of work which the directly recruited Agricultural Officers have to put in substantially differs from the quality of work which can be entrusted to Deputy Agricultural Officers like the contesting respondents. As noted earlier out of the total posts of Agricultural Officers under the Agriculture Department of the appellant-State only 1018 posts can be made available for Deputy Agricultural Officers on interchangeable basis. 1372 posts are exclusively meant to be manned by directly recruited Agricultural Officers. In view of these distinguishing features between the two groups of employees and especially in the light of the further fact that they form two separate cadres of gazetted and non-gazetted officers governed by different sets of service rules which in turn required maintenance of separate seniority lists, and on which aspect also there was no dispute between the parties, it is not possible to agree with the contention of learned counsel for the contesting respondents that only on the doctrine of Equal Pay for Equal Work the pay scale available to gazetted employees like Agricultural Officers must of necessity be made available to non-gazetted employees like Deputy Agricultural Officers on the pain of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. In our view the Tribunal had patently erred in applying the said doctrine to the facts of the present cases. The decision of the Tribunal amounts to giving equal treatment to totally distinct and unequal categories of employees. The common judgment of the Tribunal, therefore, cannot be sustained.

Decision (1 = appeal accepted, 0 = rejected): 1

Explanation:
1[ds]17. It becomes at once clear that in that case this Court was not concerned with a situation wherein there was dissimilarity of educational qualifications among the concerned groups of employees who were not offered the same pay scale. On the contrary in para 12 of the Report it has been clearly observed that the petitioners before this Court possessed the same qualifications, namely, B.A., B.Ed. as were possessed by the employees in the regular cadre and some of the petitioners before this Court were having even higher degrees like M.A., M.Ed. Under these circumstances when the State failed to establish different types of duties being discharged by these employees parity of pay scales was ordered to be granted to the petitioners. However the fact situation in the present case is entirely different. Hence no assistance can be rendered by the aforesaid decision to the contesting respondents. Our attention was then invited by learned counsel for the respondents to a decision of this Court in the case of Jaipal and others v. State of Haryana and others, JT 1988(2) SC 528 : 1988 Supp. 1 SCR 411. In this decision another Division Bench of this Court speaking through K.N. Singh, J. had to consider two identical schemes floated by the State of Haryana with the object of imparting literacy (functional and awareness) to adult illiterates and to provide literacy to children keeping away from schools. Even though the petitioners were discharging the same type of duties as instructors they were being paid a fixed salary of Rs. 200/- per month while under the second scheme, the employees discharging similar duties were offered a running pay scale of Rs. 420-700/-. On facts it was found that there was no difference in the nature of duties of the instructor and squad teachers. Both of them carried out similar work under the same employer and only on the ground that the instructors were part-time employees they could not be offered a fixed salary of Rs. 200/- per month. It becomes at once clear that there was no difference of educational qualifications amongst these twin sets of employees and the only ground on which difference of payment could be justified by the State was that they were employed under a different scheme and were working part-time only for four hours. On these peculiar facts of the case, therefore, it was held that instructors were entitled to same pay scale as sanctioned to squad teachers on the principle of Equal Pay or Equal Work. As the said decision also is rendered in the light of its peculiar facts it is not possible to agree with the learned counsel for the contesting respondents that the ratio of the said decision also gets squarely attracted to the facts of the present case. It is now time for us to take stock of thethe light of the well established facts on the record of these cases, to which we have made a reference earlier, it is impossible to hold that the Deputy Agricultural Officers like the contesting respondents are required to be given the same pay scale as Agriculturalview of these distinguishing features between the two groups of employees and especially in the light of the further fact that they form two separate cadres of gazetted and non-gazetted officers governed by different sets of service rules which in turn required maintenance of separate seniority lists, and on which aspect also there was no dispute between the parties, it is not possible to agree with the contention of learned counsel for the contesting respondents that only on the doctrine of Equal Pay for Equal Work the pay scale available to gazetted employees like Agricultural Officers must of necessity be made available to non-gazetted employees like Deputy Agricultural Officers on the pain of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. In our view the Tribunal had patently erred in applying the said doctrine to the facts of the present cases. The decision of the Tribunal amounts to giving equal treatment to totally distinct and unequal categories of employees. The common judgment of the Tribunal, therefore, cannot be sustained.