The main legal point established in the judgment is that the promotion of the petitioner to the post of Enforcement Inspector was in accordance with the 1970 Rules governing the recruitment and promotions in the Jammu Municipal Corporation.

ORDER :

1. The petitioner is aggrieved of and has called in question JMC Order No. 04 of 2022 dated 25.04.2022 whereby the petitioner has been promoted as Enforcement Inspector. The short grievance of the petitioner is that as per Jammu Municipality Subordinate Service Rules, 1970 [‘1970 Rules’] the petitioner is entitled to be promoted as Assistant Sanitation Officer, a post which carries slightly higher pay scale than the pay scale of the post of Enforcement Inspector. The entire case of the writ petitioner is built on the premise that the petitioner, who is holding the post of Sanitary Inspector since the year 1993 and has also worked as in-charge Assistant Sanitation Officer, is entitled under 1970 Rules to be promoted to the next higher post of Assistant Sanitation Officer. The grievance of the petitioner is that the respondents, in ignorance of his seniority position, promoted him to the post of Enforcement Inspector which does not fall in the line of his promotion.

2. The respondents have filed their objections and have contested the claim of the petitioner seeking promotion to the post of Assistant Sanitation Officer. To put it in a nutshell, the stand of the respondents is that the pay scale of Assistant Sanitation Officer is 9300-348001+4300 grade pay and that of Enforcement Inspector is 9300-34800+4280 grade pay. Since the posts under both the categories of Assistant Sanitation Officer and Enforcement Inspector were vacant and required to be filled through DPC, as such, the senior among the Sanitary Inspectors were considered for promotion as Assistant Sanitation Officer having higher scale as per availability of the posts and next in the seniority having LSGD qualification were considered for the post of Enforcement Inspectors having one step lower scale. It is submitted that the promotion to the aforesaid twin posts were made purely on the basis of seniority and availability of posts.

3. Having heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the material on record, it is seen that the recruitment and promotions in the Jammu Municipal Corporation are governed by the 1970 Rules promulgated vide SRO 292 dated 25.06.1970. As per the annexure appended with the aforesaid Rules, Sanitary Inspector which figures as category (III)(A), is entitled to be promoted either as Sanitation/Compost Officer which appears to have now been designated as Assistant Sanitation Officer or as the Tax/Khilafwarzi Inspector. However, the Sanitary Inspectors having qualification of LSGD alone are entitled to be promoted as Enforcement Inspectors. That being the clear position emerging from the aforesaid Rules, it was for the respondents to pick up the senior most Sanitary Inspectors for the higher posts of Assistant Sanitation Officer as per availability of posts and promote the rest against available posts of Khilafwarzi/Enforcement Inspector. As per the latest Government Order bearing No. 78-HUD/2019 dated 09.03.2019 whereby sanction strength of various categories of posts has been prescribed, there are three posts of Assistant Sanitation Officer available in the Jammu Municipal Corporation, two of which are already filled up by promotion of two incumbents, namely Rajinder Kumar and Parshotam Kumar. Both are admittedly senior to the petitioner. The 3rd post which is available has been kept reserved in respect of one Ramesh Wazir in terms of some orders passed by this Court.

4. In that view of the matter, the respondents have done well to promote the senior most among the Sanitary Inspectors against the posts of Assistant Sanitation Officer and rest like the petitioner and one Shahnawaz were rightly promoted as Enforcement Inspectors in the slightly lower pay scale. This has been done strictly in terms of 1970 Rules.

5. Viewed thus, I find no merit in this petition. However, Mr. Basotra learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that two posts of Assistant Sanitation Officer are available with the respondents and the petitioner