NATIONAL UNION OF ALL INDIA RADIO AND ORS. ETC. versus UNION OF INDIA AND ANOTHER ETC.

Citation: [1990] 2 S.C.R. 340 · Decided: 05-04-1990 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: RANGANATH MISRA · Disposal: Disposed off

Judgment (excerpt)

A 
NATIONAL UNION OF ALL INDIA RADIO 
AND ORS. ETC. 
v. 
UNION OF INDIA AND ANOTHER ETC. 
~ 
;A 
APRIL 5, 1990 
B 
[RANGANATH MISRA, P.B. SAWANT AND 
K. RAMASWAMY, JJ] 
Constitution of India-Article 32-A.I.R.-Staff Artists-Con-
-~ 
tinuation of contractual employment-Justification for. 
c 
Staff Artists of AU India Radio/Doordarsh~n, after complying 
with the initial requirements, used to _)Je appointed t~ various positions 
like Announcer, News Readers, Conductor, Music Compere, Instru-
mentalists, Producer and Script Writer etc., on contract basis upto the 
age of 55 years. In May 1982, Union of India bifurcated the Staff Artists _ 
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into two categories like (i) Staff Artists to be treated as artists and (ii) 
_,..,. 
Staff Artists to be treated as Government Servants. These two sets of 
writ petitions have been filed by the Staff artists challenging the said 
Government derision conveyed through circular dated 3.5.1982 and 
calling upon the staff to exercise option by the end of December, 
1983 for final allocation tO the two categories aforesaid. In the first writ 
E 
petition direction is sought to the respondents to treat the Staff Artists 
at par with regular government servants and to restrain the respon-
... 
dents from enforcing their direction in regard to their exercise of option 
. ,..., 
and in the other writ petition, the petitioners have asked for a direction 
to treat the staff artists as government servants entitled to pensionary 
benefits. 
F 
The Court by its order dated 25.4.1988, on perusal of the letter 
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together with the scheme_, ~nt by the Director General of All India 
Radio and following its earlier oecision in Civil Appeal No 384 of 1977 
--
Union of India v. M.A. Chowdhary, A.I.R. 1987 S.C. 1526 declared 
that all the staff artists of All India Radio are holding civil posts under 
G the Government, and they are governed by Article 311(2) of the 
Constitution and accordingly inter alia directed the Government of 
India to review the entire situation and to prepare a fresh scheme in 
accordance with law having regard to the nature of duties performed by 
each cate~ory of staff artists and further directed the case to come up 
for directions on 5. 9.1988. Thereafter the Government of India for- •
H 
mulated llSCbeme in Compliance with the collrts order and submitted it to 
the Court. 
340 
r 
N.U.A.I.R. & ORS.v. U.0.1. & ANR. !MISRA, J.J 
341 
Disposing of the writ petitions with directions, this Court, 
HELD: While dealing with the Artists as a class it is necessary 
that their special status he borne in mind. It is a class of people who are 
indeed specially privileged either by nalural gift or by their own cultur-
ing of the art. This category of people cannot be equated with ordinary 
Government servants for every purpose. [348F] 
The All India Radio and the Doordarshan in their normal func-
tioning would to a considerable extent depend upon qualitative and 
efficient artists in order to make their programmes reach the desired 
level. [348G] 
The age-old practice of the job of the staff artists being con-
tractual (whether short or long) is being given up and contractual emp-
loyment is being substituted by status based Government service. If 
there are really efficient Artists of different classificat!!J11s who do not 
want to be branded as Government servants, there is no immediate 
justification for discontinuing and disturbing them in toto. [348H; 349A] 
Administrative scrutiny instead of judicial determination would 
be more helpful. The Court therefore directed that in the appropriate 
Ministry a High Power Committee be set up for examination of the 
objections with reference to the terms of the scheme and the final deci-
A 
B 
c 
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sion be taken by the Government within six months. The views expres-
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sed in the .present decision be taken into account while dealing with the 
objections for purpose of finalising the scheme. [349E; F-G] 
ORIGINAL JURISDICTION: Writ Petition No. 13636/83 & 
11760-66/84. 
(Under Article 32 of the Constitution oflndia). 
F 
G. Ramaswamy, A.K. Ganguli, M.K. Ramamurthy, Kapil Sibal, 
R.K. Garg, S. Srinivasan, D.K. Garg, Ms. A. Subhashini, B. Parth-
asarthi, C. V. Subba Rao, M.A. Krishnamurthy, V. Shekhar, H.S. 
Mann, Ms. Chandan Krishnamurthy and Ms. Kamini Jaiswal for the 
G 
appearing parties. 
The Judgment of the Court was delivered by 
RANGANATH MISRA, J. These are applications under Article 
32 of the Constitution. Petitioner No. 1 in the fir

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