CENTRAL ADMINISTRATIVE TRIBUNAL
BANGALORE BENCH, BANGALORE
ORIGINAL APPLICATION NO.174/2008
DATED THIS THE DAY OF AUGUST, 2010
HON'BLE SHRI N.D.RAGAHVAN ….VICE CHAIRMAN
HON'BLE SMT. LEENA MEHENDALE ….MEMBER(A)
N.
Kausalya,
Aged
about 55 years,
W/o
Sri Ganapathy,
Upper
Division Clerk,
O/o
the Additional.Director,
Central
Government Health Scheme,
3rd
Floor, 'E' Wing, Kendriya Sadan,
Koramangala,
Bangalore – 560 034.
R/at
No.215, (New No.1852) VIII Cross,
II
Block, Viswapriya Nagar, Begur Road,
Bangalore
– 560 034. ... Applicant
(By Advocate Shri K. Haniffa)
1.
The Additional Director,
Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS),
3rd Floor, 'E' Wing,
Kendriya Sadan, Koramangala,
Bangalore – 560 034.
2.
The Director, CGHS-II,
Directorate General of Health Services,
Nirman Bhavan,
New Delhi – 560 034.
3.
Union of India,
Rep. by its Secretary,
Ministry of Health & Family Welfare,
New Delhi.
4.
Sri V. Vasudevan,
Office Superintendent,
O/o the Additional.Director,
Central Government Health Scheme,
3rd Floor, 'E' Wing, Kendriya
Sadan,
Koramangala, Bangalore – 560 034. .... Respondents
(By Advocate Shri V.N. Holla,
Addl Central Govt. Standing Counsel
for R-1 to R-3 and R-4 party in
person)
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O R D E R
Hon'ble
Smt. Leena Mehendale, Member (A) :
Aggrieved
by the promotion order dated 4th December, 2007 (Annexure-A/6) ,
that denies her claim, the applicant has filed this OA under Section 19 of the
Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985.
2. The applicant is working as UDC in CGHS since
25.10.1996. She is entitled to promotion
as Office Superintendent in due course.
Alternatively, if she possesses some special qualification, then she is
also entitled to the promotion of Accountant.
On the other hand, employees working as Stenographers Gr.II are also
entitled to be promoted as Office Superintendent and the alternative promotion
avenue for them is Stenographer Gr.I.
3. Annexure-A/3 produced before us by the learned counsel for
the applicant is the Office Memorandum dated 03.07.2007 circulating the
seniority list of UDCs as on 03.07.2007, in which the name of the applicant is
at Sl.No.1. However, on 4.12.2007, a
promotion to the post of Office Superintendent was given retrospectively with
effect from 19.7.2007 to another colleague of the applicant, respondent No.4
herein, who was earlier working in the grade of Stenographer Gr.II
(Annexure-A/6). In this connection, a
notification dated 24.9.1986 issued by the Ministry of Health & Family
Welfare, describes the rules for regulating the method of recruitment to the
post of Office Superintendent in the CGHS (Annexure-A/7). Column 12 of the schedule to the notification
which pertains to promotion to the post of Office Superintendent prescribes the
following eligibility criteria:-
"Promotion:- Upper Division Clerks/Stenographers Gr.II
with 5 years service in the respective grades in the concerned city and minimum
of two years' experience of administrative work."
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4.
The
main contentions of the learned counsel for the applicant were four.
First,
the Respondent No.4 who is the Stenographer Gr.II has a separate promotional
channel to be promoted as Stenographer Gr.I.
The applicant has only one channel unless she possesses the extra
qualification i.e. Accountancy to be promoted as Accountant. Thus, there is no
parity and equity in the rules which allow only one promotional channel to UDC,
but, two promotional avenues to Stenographers, Gr.II.
Secondly,
in the Recruitment Rules at Annexure-A/7 column No.12 quoted above, the
words UDC and Stenographer Gr.II are
juxtaposed in a typical manner. It first
mentions the word UDC followed by a slash followed by the word Stenographers
Gr.II. As per the learned counsel for
the applicant, this manner of wording must be construed as a direction that
only UDCs should be initially considered for promotion to the post of Office
Superintendent and only if there is no proper UDC available, the list of
Stenographers Gr.II should be considered.
Thirdly,
the pay scale of the applicant is Rs.4000-6000/- and the pay scale of
Respondent No.4 is Rs.5000-8000/-. The applicant
therefore challenges Annexure-A/12 which is the details of inter-se seniority
of UDCs/Stenographers Gr.II submitted by Respondent No.4 which indicates the
date of regular appointment in the feeder cadre for Respondent No.4 as
14.09.1992 and for the applicant as 25.10.1996.
It also mentions the date of eligibility for promotion to the post of
Office Superintendent for them both as 14.09.1997 and 25.10.2001
respectively. The applicant challenges
this inter-se seniority
list on the ground that they are
two different posts in two different pay scales and therefore cannot be
combined to determine a common inter-se seniority.
Fourthly,
the applicant relies on the fact that she happened, by way of an application to
point out to the department that the post of Office Superintendent was lying
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vacant and applied for the
same, Hence, she has the first claim for
promotion.
5. The respondents have relied upon the inter-se seniority at
Annexure-A/12 and the Recruitment Rules at Annexure-A/7 and have argued that in
view of these two documents, not much is left to be said, as to why the claim
of the applicnt can stand only after the claim of Respondent No.4.
6. We have heard and considered both the submissions. It is common practice in the Government to
allow diverse feeder cadres to be brought together for the purpose of promotion
to higher post and we see nothing wrong in the Recruitment Rules at
Annexure-A/7. The argument of the
learned counsel for the applicant regarding the interpretation of slash '(/)'
for which he relies on the dictionary meaning and has quoted elaborately from
the dictionary, is rejected. Whenever eligibility of two different cadres is to
be indicated, the slash is a commonly used symbol and by tradition it never
indicates the preference of the first over the second. If such a preference was
to be given, the wording used, in keeping with the present government tradition
would have been "first from the cadre of UDCs and on not getting the
suitable candidates, from the cadre of Stenographers Gr.II".
7. The OA is thus dismissed.
No order as to costs.
(LEENA
MEHENDALE) (N.D.
RAGHAVAN)
MEMBER (A) VICE CHAIRMAN
psp.
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