Srinagar, April 03: The High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh has directed J&K Projects Construction Corporation Limited (JKPCC) and its Administrative Department to take a decision regarding absorption of casual labourers including the petitioner engaged by it.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice N. Kotiswar Singh and Sanjay Dhar set aside a single judge bench verdict wherein the court had quashed the order of JKPCC declining the regularization of petitioner.
The petitioner, who was engaged as Planning Assistant on a casual basis in 2002, had stated that 58 Trainee Engineers were absorbed by the Corporation in 2011 but similar treatment was denied to her.
However, the Corporation contended that the petitioner was engaged as a casual labourer on need basis and not as a Trainee Engineer, as such, her case is entirely different from the case of other Trainee Engineers who have been absorbed by the Corporation.
It was contended by the Corporation that the name of the petitioner figures at serial No.776 of the list of casual labourers and there are 1069 casual labourers on the rolls of the Corporation and, as such, her services could not have been regularized by ignoring the claim of other casual labourers who figure senior to her in the list of casual labourers.
The Corporation also stated that it has regularized 132 casual labourers as per seniority and cases of the petitioner and other casual labourers has been forwarded to the Administrative Department for regularization which awaits approval from the said department and as and when the approval is accorded, the petitioner will also be regularized as per seniority.
The court after perusing the material on record noted that it was not open to the Writ Court to direct regularization of the petitioner without specifying against which post she is to be regularized.
The bench said that it is not clear from the record as to whether Trainee Engineers who were absorbed were engaged on the basis of any selection process and as to whether they were initially engaged as casual labourers who have found their way into the absorption order, as has been claimed by the petitioner.
“All these questions need to be gone into by the appellant Corporation and its Administrative Department who are, admittedly, seized of the matter relating to absorption of casual labours engaged in the appellant Corporation as per their seniority,” the court said.
Allowing the appeal of the Corporation the bench directed the Corporation and its Administrative Department to take a decision regarding absorption of casual laborers engaged by the Corporation would include the case of the writ petitioner as well.
The bench directed the Corporation to also keep in mind the fact that the petitioner has been continuously working with it for the last about twenty years while considering the case of the petitioner.
