The main legal point established in the judgment is the entitlement of pensionary benefits for employees appointed prior to a certain date and subsequently regularized, as well as the requirement to count their past services for the grant of pensionary benefits.

ORDER :

1. The present batch of writ petitions have been preferred by the petitioners against the impugned order dated 04.11.2016 (Annexure-P/1) passed by the respondent authorities, so far as it relates to deprivation of pension. The petitioners are seeking pensionary benefits and arrears of pay from the date of their initial appointment along with interest.

2. Brief facts of the case are that the petitioners, who were working as Assistant Surgeon, were appointed on adhoc basis in the respondent Department in the years 1985, 1987, 1992 & 1993, as the case may be, and have been subsequently regularized vide impugned order dated 04.11.2016 (Annexure-P/1), but their past services have not been counted, as such they are not entitled for pensionary benefits, however, some of the Assistant Surgeons have been regularized from the date of their initial appointment and were granted the consequential benefits, but the petitioners were deprived of the same, however, oral assurance was given to the petitioners that they would be regularized from the date of their initial appointments and vide letter dated 05.08.2016, the medical officers who were appointed before 31.12.1997 were assured to be regularized from the date of their initial appointments, but vide impugned order dated 04.11.2016 (Annexure-P/1) issued by the respondent authorities, the medical officers including the present petitioners who were appointed prior to 31.12.1997 have been deprived of their pensionary benefits as well as arrears of pay, against which the present writ petitions have been filed by the petitioners.

3. Learned Senior counsel appearing for the petitioners submits that the action of the respondents is irrational, arbitrary and discriminatory in nature. The impugned order violates the petitioners’ right to equality as enshrined under Article 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. It is well settled position of law that pension is neither a bounty nor a matter of grace depending upon the sweet will of the employer nor an ex-gratia payment, rather it is a payment for the past services rendered. The pick and choose method adopted by the respondent authorities is arbitrary, as similarly situated medical officer has been granted regularization from the date of initial appointment, whereas the present petitioners are being deprived of all the benefits, to which they are entitled. The appointment of petitioners is neither illegal nor irregular as they are appointed under the special recruitment scheme after inviting application through the advertisement published in daily news paper and the petitioners appeared before the selection committee and faced the interview. Therefore the petitioners are entitled to regularization from date of initial appointment and to all consequential benefits from the date of initial appointment. The most of the petitioners had served for more than 30 years without any break in service and they are getting annual grade increment and an employee having such a length of service under no law or rules has been disentitled from pension and other benefits. It is settled position of law that if the initial appointment has been made by following the due procedure of law and the appointee continues uninterruptedly till the regularization of their services in accordance with the rules, the period of officiating services will be counted from the initial date of appointment. Once an incumbent is appointed to a post according to rule, his seniority has to be counted from the date of his appointment and not according to the date of his confirmation, therefore the order impugned is bad in the eyes of law. The impugned order is contrary to the C.G. Civil Services (General Conditions of service) Rules, 1961 Rules and thus the order impugned is bad and deserves to be quashed. Reliance has been placed on the judgments rendered by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the matter of Bhupendra Nath Hazarika and another vs State of Assam and others, reported in (2013) 2