Article 371-D of the Constitution, read with the Presidential Order issued thereunder, confers exclusive jurisdiction on the Administrative Tribunal to deal with matters relating to appointment, including the selection process, and bars the jurisdiction of the High Court to entertain or decide such matters.

K. BHASKARAN C. J.

( 1 ) IT is convenient to dispose of all these writ petitions (28 in number) by a common judgement as there arises a common point, and that is the only paint for decision, in all of them; and that point is whether a Writ of Mandamus would issue from t his Court to the respective respondents to consider the applications for appointment in respect of the petitioners with out insisting an their being sponsored by the Employment Exchange, as according to them, the provisions of the Employment Exchange (Compulsory Notification of Vacancies) Act, 1959 did not prohibit the consideration of such applications received direct from the candidate. Their contention is that under the said Act, once the employer makes the requisition to the concerned Employment Exchange, his liability ceases and the employer is not precluded from candidate direct the applications received from the candidate direct. The petitioners placed reliance on the decision of a learned single judge of this Court in Sankara Reddy s case (1979) 1 Andh LT 404 and a decision of the Division Bench in N. Hara Gopal s case (1985) 3 APLJ 150 : (1986 Lab IC 182 ). (N. Hara Gopal s case is reversed by Supreme Court. Pl. refer AIR 1987 SC 1227 : 1987 Lab IC 915

( 2 ) ON 2-2-1987 when W. P. Nos. 1001/87 and 1021/87 came up before Kodandaramayya, J. , for admission the learned Judge referred the matter to a Division Bench on account of the interim order passed by the Supreme Court on 9-1-1987, which reads as follows :-"list the appeal along with Civil Appeals Nos. 9-15/86. Pending disposal of the stay application and notwithstanding any orders made by the High Court in other cases, recruitment will be effected in accordance with G. O. Ms. No. 535, Dated June 28, 1975 and G. O. Rt. , No. 1406, Dated November 6, 1975 issued by the State Government. The Transfer Petitions are dismissed in terms of the signed order placed on the file. "when the matter was before the Division Bench, which consisted of two of us (the Chief Justice and Anjaneyulu, J.) a preliminary objection with respect to the maintainability of the writ petitions in view of the bar under Art. 371-D of the Constitution was raised. The learned Advocate General, who appeared and assisted the Court at our request, submitted that the decision in Dr. Venkat Reddy s case (1982 Lab IC 1927 (Andh Pra)), on which the petitioners placed reliance, required reconsideration. As the Division Bench also doubted the soundness of the decision in the said case, it was referred to a Full Bench along with other cases involving the same question; and that was how these cases are before us.

( 3 ) THE historical background of the insertion of Art. 371-D into the Constitution is wellknown. In the year 1956, as a result of the reorganisation of States on linguistic basis, the Andhra and Telangana regions came to be merged, paving the way for the formation of the new State of Andhra Pradesh. There was a massive agitation for a separate State by the people of Telangana arising out of discontentment with respect to conditions in Government service which were at variance in different regions. The high-level deliberations in a bid to find a durable solution culminated in what is known as the six point formula dated September 21, 1973 which was intended to secure balanced development of the State as a whole, providing equitable opportunities to different areas of the State in the matter of education and employment in public services. The implementation of this six point Formula envisaged inter alia amendment of the Constitution conferring power on the President of India to take the necessary steps in order to secure smooth implementation of the measures based upon the said formula without giving rise to litigation and consequent uncertainty. Inasmuch as one of the measures contemplated in that formula related to the setting up of an Administrative Tribunal with jurisdiction to deal with grievances relating to public services, Art. 3

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