JUDGMENT

M. Jagannadha Rao, J.-Leave granted.

2. The appellant Mr. Sarabjit Singh (2nd respondent in the writ petition) is aggrieved by the judgment of the Division Bench of High Court of Punjab & Haryana dated 7.6.2000 in CWP No.13240/99 allowing the same in favour of the 1st respondent-writ petitioner, Ex. Major B.D. Gupta. The High Court accepted the contention of the 1st respondent that the Departmental Promotion Committee of the State of Punjab was governed by the guidelines issued by the Central Government which were adopted by the State on 1.10.1999 and held that if those guidelines were applied, the DPC would have had to consider eight Superintending Engineers for promotion to the post of Chief Engineer and not merely five as done in this case, and if that had been done, the writ petitioner, Ex. Major B.D. Gupta would have come within the said zone of consideration and he could not have been omitted from consideration as was done by the DPC. Further under the Central Guidelines, as adopted by the State on 1.10.99, candidates had to get the grading of very good while under the earlier State guidelines, "good" was sufficient. Hence the selection of Respondents 2 to 4 in CWP, namely Mr. Sarabjit Singh (appellant), Mr. B.K. Thapar and Mr. D.P. Bajaj as Chief Engineers was liable to set aside. The High Court directed a fresh DPC to be conducted in accordance with the State Government s circular dated 1.10.1999 where the State had adopted the Central guidelines. That is how this appeal came to be filed by Sri Sarabjit Singh. Before the matter was listed in this Court, the appellant was reverted back as Superintending Engineer and a fresh date was fixed for the meeting of the DPC to consider eight names, including that of the respondent-writ petitioner and others. This Court stayed the fresh meeting of the DPC.

3. In this appeal, learned senior counsel for the appellant Sri P.P. Rao contended that the High Court failed to notice that the DPC had met on 16.4.99. by which date the Circular of the Punjab Government dated 1.10.99 adopting the Central Government s guidelines had not come into being. The other circular dated 25.11.95 of the State Government referred to the Central Government s guidelines only to the limited extent that the DPC must meet periodically. Counsel contended that the earlier Punjab Guidelines 28.6.61 applied and the DPC which met on 16.4.99 rightly followed the said guidelines of 28.6.61 under which, on the facts of the case, it was sufficient to consider the cases of five Superintending Engineers and inasmuch as the writ petitioner (Ex. Major B.D. Gupta) fell beyond five in the seniority (being sixth), the DPC was not obliged to consider his case. The selection of the appellant and two others (Respondents 2 to 4 in the CWP) was perfectly in order).

4. In this appeal, so far as the State of Punjab is concerned, the learned counsel Sri Rajiv Dutta submitted that the State had filed a brief counter affidavit here without supporting either side while, no doubt, the State had filed a counter-affidavit in the High Court supporting the appellant.

5. The contesting respondent in this appeal is the writ petitioner (Ex. Major B.D. Gupta) and he filed a separate counter-affidavit and appeared in person. He contended that he had a fundamental right to be considered for promotion. Of course, he agreed that in respect of a DPC dated 16.4.99 the Punjab circular dated 1.10.99 could not have been applied and the High Court was wrong in applying the said circular. He, however, referred to the Punjab guidelines dated 17.6.60 and contended that they applied to the DPC and that for each post to be filled, atleast three officers had to be considered. In this case, for two posts, six names should have been considered and he (Mr. B.D. Gupta) was the sixth person in the list. In fact, here three persons were ultimately selected, as one was on deputation.

6. Adverting to the above contention of the respondent-writ petitioner, Sri P.