PUNJAB STATE ELECTRICITY BOARD AND OTHERS versus JAGJIWAN RAM AND ORS.

Citation: [2009] 3 S.C.R. 209 · Decided: 12-02-2009 · Supreme Court of India · Bench: B.N. AGRAWAL · Disposal: Appeal(s) allowed

Cited by 1 judgment(s) · see the full citation network in Lexace

Judgment (excerpt)

210 
SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
(2009] 3 S.C.R. 
A filed the appeal. 
Allowing the appeals, the Court 
HELD: 1.1 Work-charged employees are engaged for 
execution of a specified work or project and their 
B engagement comes to an end on completion of the work 
or project. The source and mode of engagement/ 
recruitment, their pay, conditions of employment, and 
their duties and responsibilities are substantially different 
from the persons appointed in the regular establishment 
C against sanctioned posts after following the procedure 
prescribed under the relevant Act or rules. They cannot 
be treated at par with the employees of regular 
establishment. Service of a work charged-employee in 
the work charged establishment cannot be clubbed with 
D service in a regular establishment unless a specific 
provision to that effect is made either in the relevant 
statute or the scheme of Regularization. If the statute or 
scheme under which service of work charged employee 
is regularized does not provide for counting of past 
E service, the work charged employee cannot claim benefit 
of such service for the purpose of fixation of seniority in 
the regular cadre, promotion to the higher posts, fixation 
of pay in the higher scales, grant of increments etc. [Para 
7] [218-A] 
F 
Jaswant Singh and others v. Union of India and others 
(1979) 4 SCC 440 and State of Rajasthan v. Kunji Raman 
(1997) 2 sec 517, relied on. 
State of Haryana v. Haryana Veterinary & AHTS 
G Association and another (2000) 8 sec 4; State of Punjab and 
others v. Gurdeep Kumar Uppal and others (2003) 11 SCC 
732 and State of Punjab and others v. /shar Singh and other 
(2002) 10 sec 674, referred to. 
H 
1.2. Under the scheme framed by the Board, the 
• 
.. 
• 
• 
PUNJAB STATE ELECTRICITY BOARD AND ORS. v. 
211 
JAGJIWAN RAM AND ORS. 
benefit of time bound promotional scales was to be given 
A 
to the employees only on their completing 9/16 years 
regular service. Likewise, the benefit of promotional 
increments could be given only on completion of 23 
years regular service. The use of the term ·regular 
service' in various paragraphs of the scheme shows that 
8 
service rendered by an employee after regular 
appointment could only be counted for computation of 
9/16/23 years service, and not the service rendered as an 
adhoc or work-charged employee, for extending the 
benefit of time bound promotional scales or promotional 
C 
increments. The respondents were not entitled to the 
benefit of time bound promotional scales I promotional 
increments from a date prior to completion of 9/16/23 
years regular service and the High Court committed 
serious error by directing the appellants to give them 
0 
benefit of the scheme by counting their work charged 
service. [Para 13] [226-E; 227-A] 
Case Law Reference: 
(2000) s sec 4 
(2003) 11 sec 132 
(2002) 10 sec 674 
(1979) 4 sec 440 
(1997) 2 sec s11 
referred to 
referred to 
referred to 
relied on 
relied on 
·para 4 
para 4 
para 4 
para 8 
para 9 
CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION : Civil Appeal No. 890 
of 2009. 
E 
F 
From the final Judgment and Order dated 26.5.2005 of the 
G 
High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh in CWP No. 
4185 of 2005. 
WITH 
Civil Appeal No. 891 of 2009 
'H 
A 
B 
c 
D 
212 
. SUPREME COURT REPORTS 
[2009] 3 S.CR . 
Satinder S. Gulati, Kamaldeep Gulati, Dr. Kailash Chand, 
J.S. Puri and Yash Pal Dhingra for the Appellants. 
Surijit Singh, R.K. Talwar, Sanjay K. Hadala, S.L. Aneja, 
K.L. Taneja, S. Janani, Deepak Goel, K.G. Bhagat, Manju 
Bhagat, Vineet Bhagat, Manohar Singh Bakshi, Kasturi Lal and 
Debasis Misra for the Respondents. 
The Judgment of the court was delivered by 
G.S. SINGHVI, J. 1. Leave granted. 
2. With a view to give relief to the employees who were 
stagnating in particular positions for a long period of time, the 
Punjab State Electricity Board [for short, "the Board"] 
introduced a scheme for giving time bound promotional scales/ 
increments on completion of 9/16/23 years of regular service. 
The same was circulated vide office order dated 23rd April, 
1990, the relevant portions of which are extracted below:-
"In continuation consolidation and sup1~rsession of 
instructions contained in this office order No.174/PRC/Fin-
E 
1988 dated 17.07.1989, Memo No.11163/11863/PRC/ 
Fin-1/1988/L-Vl/(Prop) dated 19.1.1990 and O/o No.194/ 
PRC/Fin-1988, dated 30.03.1990. 
F 
G 
H 
The Punjab State Electricity Board have been seized of 
the problems of stagnation prevailing

Excerpt shown. Read the full judgment & AI analysis in Lexace.