Jatya Pal Singh & Ors vs Union Of India & Ors

5. For the purpose of this order, we shall make a reference to the facts as pleaded in C.A.No.2147 of 2010. All the appellants in writ petitions had been working in the Ministry of Communication, in particular, Department of Overseas Communication Service (OCS) from 1st March, 1971 onwards. Their dates of appointment on various posts are as under :

6. Appellant Nos. 1 and 2 were appointed as Assistant Engineer on 16th May 1983 and 1st September, 1983, respectively. Appellant Nos. 3 and 4 were appointed as Junior Technical Assistant on 1st March, 1971 and 13th January, 1976 and appellants 5 and 6 were appointed on 8th January, 1980. During their continuous service with respondent No.1, they had earned promotions at due time on merit. They have a clean record of service. Till 31st March, 1986, they were holding responsible posts in the OCS.

8. The Govt. created a department in ministry of telecommunication known as Overseas Communication Service (OCS) that dealt communication of India subjects with the rest of the world.

30. Civil Appeal No.2147 of 2010 pertains to the group of employees detailed in category ‘a’ above. The appellants in C.A.No.425 of 2012 are from category ‘b’. In C.A.No.2647 of 2010, the VSNL terminated the services of appellants 2, 3, and 4 on 13th July, 2007 and those of appellants 1, 5, and 6 on 16th July, 2007. The termination letter of appellant Nos. 2, 3, and 4 is issued by Vice President while as those of appellant Nos. 1 and 5 is issued by the Chief Officer Global operation. The termination order of appellant No.6 is issued by the Chief International Facilities Officer.

37. In view of the above, learned senior counsel submitted that all these appeals deserve to be dismissed.

44. On perusal of the facts, it would be evident that test No.3 would also not be satisfied as TCL does not enjoy a monopoly status in ILDS. So far as domestic market is concerned, there is open competition between the numerous operators, some of which have been enumerated earlier namely, MTNL, Airtel, Idea, Aircel, etc. This brings us to the 4th test and again we are unable to hold that the Government of India exercises deep and pervasive control in either the management or policy making of TCL which are purely private enterprises. We may also notice that in fact even Government Companies like MTNL and BSNL are competitors of TCL, in respect of ILDS. We are, therefore, of the firm opinion that the High Court of Delhi and the High Court of Bombay were fully justified in rejecting the claim of the appellants that TCL would be amenable to writ jurisdiction of the High Court by virtue of the other authority within the purview of Article 12 of the Constitution of India.

(c) the nature and extent of the public interest in the function in question ;

(e) the extent to which the state, directly or indirectly, regulates, supervises or inspects the performance of the function in question ;

Performance of public function by private provider –

(a) the legal status of the person who performs the function, or

(b) whether the person performs the function by reason of a contractual or other agreement or arrangement”.

53. In these appeals, the claim of the appellants is that their services have been wrongly terminated by VSNL/TCL in breach of the assurances given by the Government of India and VSNL in clause 5.13 of the share holding agreement. If that be so, they would be at liberty to seek redress by taking recourse to the normal remedies available under law.

55. We see no merit in the appeals and the same are accordingly dismissed.

Writ Petition No.689 of 2007 -

56. This writ petition has been moved by the VSNL Scheduled Castes/Tribes employees Welfare Samiti (Regd.) (Petitioner No.1) and Scheduled Castes and Schedule Tribes Employees Welfare Association of VSNL (Regd.)-Petitioner No.2.

57. The prayer in this writ petition is inter alia for the issuing a writ in the nature of mandamus directing the official respondents to safeguard the fundamental rights of the members of the appellant as per the undertaking given on 16th March, 2001, 9th October, 2001 and 30th April, 2002. For the reasons already stated in the earlier part of the judgment relating to the civil appeals, we are unable to entertain the present writ petition. In our opinion, it is not maintainable and accordingly dismissed.

April 17, 2013.