Sambuddha Chakrabarti, J.

The grievances of the petitioner may be summed up briefly. On January 15, 1985 he was appointed as an Officer Scale-I (JMG) in Howrah Gramin Bank which is a rural bank constituted under the Regional Rural Bank Act, 1976. By a circular dated July 9, 1987 the Manager, Personnel Administration of the bank had published a seniority list of different categories of officers and employees. In the said list the petitioner was placed at serial no. 25.

By another circular dated January 2, 1986 it was declared by the Chairman of the bank that pursuant to the resolution adopted by the Board of Directors it had been decided to select candidates for promotion of Officers from Junior Management Grade – I to Middle Management Grade – II on the basis of selection criteria as laid down in the notification. One of the criteria was allocation of marks on certain basis which, the petitioner claims, had already been

The bank after an interview promoted respondents nos. 3 to 7 as Officers Grade II Middle Management Grade by an order dated June 20, 1996. Consequently the petitioner had been superseded by respondents nos. 6 and 7 who are juniors to the petitioners accordi