IMPORTANT POINT
Weekly offs and holidays must be included in calculating work experience for bonus marks, as excluding them violates fundamental rights.

ORDER :

Mr. Arun Monga, J. - The petitioner's grievance herein inter alia arises from the impugned order dated 31.07.2023 (Annex.16), vide which petitioner's representation was rejected by declining him the requisite bonus marks as per actual length of his work experience by excluding Sundays and Holidays from for the period he had worked. Ostensible ground in addition is that he has not provided any evidence whether he worked as a Lab Assistant or Lab Technician.

2. Relevant facts first. Petitioner since 13.11.2013 had been serving as a Lab Technician on a contractual basis and he applied for the post of Lab Assistant pursuant to an advertisement issued on May 29, 2018. The advertisement specified bonus marks for experience. The petitioner possesses 4 years, 7 months, and 15 days of work experience. Despite being listed for document verification and meeting the eligibility criteria, an office order dated September 5, 2019, forwarded incorrect work experience details by excluding Sundays and Holidays while calculating the total period of work experience. Multiple representations highlighting the petitioner's eligibility and correct bonus qua length of work experience, were turned a blind eye. Finally, by impugned order dated 31.07.2023, the respondent authorities rejected the representation of the petitioner. Hence, this writ petition.

3. In the aforesaid backdrop, I have heard the rival contentions and perused the case file.

4. The controversy raised herein is no more res integra. Reference may be had to judgment rendered by a Coordinate Bench of this Court in the case of Suresh Choudhary v. State of Rajasthan & Ors. : S.B. Civil Writ Petition No.5694/2021 decided on 14.07.2023, which reads as below:-

"1. By way of the present writ petition, the petitioner has raised a grievance that while considering his candidature, respondents have not awarded him bonus marks regardless of the fact that he has worked for more than 392 days.

2. The facts narrated briefly are that the petitioner vied for the post of Lab Technician pursuant to the Recruitment Notification dated 12.06.2020. Alongwith the application form, the petitioner claimed 10 bonus marks for having worked for 392 days as Lab Technician under 'Mukhyamantri Nishulk Janch Yojna'. In support of his claim, he furnished two certificates Nos. 8019 and 8020 dated 13.07.2020.

3. On declaration of result, the petitioner was accorded 47.792 marks, while cut off for OBC category was 48.73.

4. The petitioner has approached this Court with the grievance that the respondents have erred in not giving him 10 bonus marks, on the pretext that his actual working days after deducting 53 days weekly offs were 339.

5. The fact that the petitioner has not been awarded bonus marks is not in dispute. The only question, which requires to be decided by this Court is, as to whether the weekly holiday (Sunday) and National Holidays etc. can be excluded while calculating experience for the purpose of bonus marks?

6. The answer to this question does not require any detailed deliberation. As per the Labour Laws, all organizations/institutions/enterprises etc., whether government owned or private are, required to observe weekly offs or are bound to allow one weekly off to each employee. If the petitioner was allowed a weekly off by the respondent themselves, his experience cannot be counted hyper-technically by excluding such day offs. The State's action of calculating petitioner's working days to be 339 (324+15) days and considering such period to be the actual working days is clearly illegal and violative of petitioner's fundamental rights.

7. If 53 days of weekly offs are added in the petitioner's actual number of working days i.e. 339 as per two experience certificates (Annexure-3), the petitioner's total number of working days comes to 392 days, which is obviously more than a year.

8. To provide or allow holiday of Sunday or weekly off is a statutory duty of all the employers including State Government. section