Maternity leave must have a reasonable connection to maternity and the date of confinement, and rejection of the petitioner's application for special casual leave cannot be considered as illegal or arbitrary.

1. Petitioner is an Assistant Teacher in an Aided Upper Primary School under the Management of the fifth respondent. She is married. She had applied for maternity leave for a period of 90 days from 2-7-1984 to 29-9-1984 with permission to pre-fix 1-4-1984 to 1-7-1984 and suffix 30-9-1984. The leave application was dated 25-6-1984. That leave was sanctioned. In a subsequent letter dated 2-10-1984, she requested for special casual leave for 14 days from 8-10-1984 to 21-10-1984 since she had undergone sterilisation operation on 30-5-1984. In her letter dated 5-11-1984, she had given the date of sterilisation operation as above. In a further letter dated 4-12-1984, she reported that her last confinement was on 28-5-1984.

2. The Assistant Educational Officer informed in Ext. P1 letter dated 18-12-1984, that she would not be given special casual leave. He also altered the period of her maternity leave as 90 days from 28-5-1984 to 25-8-1984, with permission to pre-fix the summer vacation from 1-5-1984 to 27-5-1984. It was also ordered that the period of leave from 26-8-1984 to 29-9-1984 would be regularised by granting other eligible leave to the petitioner. The Assistant Educational Officer also ordered that the excess pay drawn for the period should be refunded. The Headmaster was directed to implement that order Petitioner filed an appeal against Ext. PI order to the District Educational Officer. He passed Ext. P2 order dated 26-2-1985, affirming the order of the Assistant Educational Officer. Petitioner filed a further appeal. Ext. P3, before the State Government. That was forwarded along with Ext. P4 letter of the Deputy Director of Education, Palghat. In the meantime, the fourth respondent issued Ext. P5, showcause notice, to the petitioner, requiring to state why disciplinary action should not be initiated against her for having applied for maternity leave from 2-7-1984 in respect of a delivery which was on 28-5-1984. Petitioner submits that Exts. P1, P2, P4 and P5 are liable to be quashed by the issue of a writ of certiorari. She seeks the issue of a writ of mandamus to restore the maternity leave granted to her from 2-7-1984 to 29-9-1984 and a further special casual leave from 8-10-1984 to 21-10-1984. Consequently, she seeks a direction to avoid the disciplinary proceedings initiated under Ext. P5.

3. Petitioner submits that maternity leave available to a female officer need not be in connection with maternity but for other purposes connected therewith also. He submits likewise that rule l(vii)(b) of Appendix VII, S. II, of the Kerala Service Rules relates to casual leave, confers a right on a female Government servant, who undergoes sterilisation operation, to be granted special casual leave for a period not exceeding 14 days, and that leave also need not be reasonably proximate to the sterilisation operation. According to the petitioner, female employees who apply for maternity leave, are not obliged to disclose the date of confinement and such confinement need not have any relation to the leave applied for or sanctioned. The impugned orders proceeded on the basis that maternity leave must at least be from the date of confinement, if not earlier, and cannot commence far later than the date of confinement. The submission of the petitioner is that maternity leave for 90 days is a reward for motherhood and special casual leave is reward for undergoing sterilisation operation, and both can availed of by the female employee at any time, according to her choice. Reference is made to R.100 and S. X of Part I, Kerala Service Rules That rule is in the following terms:

"100. A competent authority may grant to a female officer maternity leave on full pay for a period of 90 days from the date of its commencement".

The rule as it stood prior to its amendment in 1980 was in the following terms:

"A competent authority may grant to a female officer maternity leave on full pay for a period which may extend upto the end of three mont