The obligation of the department to consider the case of daily waged workman for conferment of daily work charge status.

Sandeep Sharma, J.

Instant writ petition is directed against the judgment dated 30.6.2016, recorded by the learned HP State Administrative Tribunal (in short “the Tribunal”), in OA No. 412 of 2016, whereby the Tribunal below while setting aside order dated 23.6.2014 (annexed with OA as Annexure P-1), directed the appellant-respondent to reconsider case of the applicant respondent herein, for conferment of the work charge status on completion of eight years service with all consequential benefits.

2. Facts as emerge from the record are that the respondent, who was engaged as Beldar on daily wage basis in HPPWD, in the year, 1994, after having completed eight years continuous service, prayed for conferment of work charge status in terms of norms laid down by the Government of Himachal Pradesh. Since writ petitioner-State failed to accede to aforesaid prayer of the respondent, he approached this Court by way of CWP No. 8852 of 2013, which came to be disposed of with direction to the State to consider the representation filed by the respondent, however fact remains that representation made sequel to aforesaid direction issued by this Court, came to be rejected vide order dated 23.6.2014. Feeling aggrieved and dis-satisfied with order dated 23.6.2014, the respondent preferred an application bearing No. OA No. 412 of 2016, before the learned Tribunal. Learned Tribunal having taken note of the decision rendered by this Court in CWP No. 4489 of 2009, Ravi Kumar v. State of H.P. and Ors, decided on 14.12.2009, wherein work charge status was ordered to be conferred on daily wagers engaged in the year 1999, arrived at conclusion that the applicant being similarly situate person, deserves to be conferred with work charge status. Learned Tribunal further held that work charge establishment is not a pre-requisite for conferment of work charge status nor conversion of work charge employees into regular employees would make the existence of such establishment non-existent. The learned Tribunal below drawing strength from observations/finding rendered by this Court in CWP No. 2735 of 2010 titled Rakesh Kumar v. State of HP, dated 28.7.2010, that regularization has no concern with the conferment of work charge status after a lapse of time, proceeded to allow the original application and directed the State to re-consider case of the applicant (respondent) for conferment of work charge status on completion of eight years.

3. Having carefully heard the learned counsel for the parties and perused judgment passed by the learned Tribunal, wherein very innocuous direction has been issued to reconsider the case of applicant(respondent) for conferment of work charge status after completion of eight years, this Court finds no justification in filing the present petition on behalf of the petitioner-State, rather it ought to have examined/considered case of the applicant (respondent) for conferment of work charge status in terms of observation made in the impugned judgment and as such, it deserves to be rejected on this sole ground. Otherwise also, material adduced on record clearly suggests that there is no dispute with regard to the completion of eight years service as far as respondent is concerned, rather it stands duly established on record that respondent, who was appointed on daily wages in the year, 1994, had completed 240 days in each calendar year continuously before completion of eight years.

4. In nutshell, case of the petitioner-State is that the applicant/respondent had worked as Class-III Work Inspector, whose work charge status stood already abolished on 1.4.2011. As per petitioner-State, in the class-III category, work charge status was abolished in the Public Works Department on 1.4.2011, whereas in Class-IV category, it was abolished on 19.8.2005 and as such, respondent is not entitled for grant of work charge status automatically, when especially he had not completed eight years service, on or before abolition of work charge on 1.