The legitimate duty of government servants to attend to their responsibilities and the authority of the government to withhold salary for unauthorized absence.

1. The Tamil Nadu Village Administrative Officers Association, Trichirappalli District filed the Original Application on the file of the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal seeking a prayer to call for the records of the first respondent in his proceedings C2/8529/2000 dated 27.4.2000 and of the ninth respondent in his Na.Ka.A1/948/2000 dated 28.4.2000 and quash the orders passed therein and direct the respondents not to deduct a days pay from the salary of the V.A.Os. for the month of April 2000 in pursuance of the impugned orders.

2. The Jamabandhi programme for the Trichy District for Fasli year 1409 from 18.04.2000 to 28.04.2000 had been published in the extraordinary issue number. 9 dated 31.3.2000 of the District Gazette, Trichirapalli. The members of the petitioner association by holding a meeting on 16.4.2000 near Trichy Junction passed a resolution that the members should not attend Jamabandhi for Fasli 1409 commencing from 18.4.2000 in Trichy District for the reasons that their various demands have not been settled by the District Administration. As a result of the resolution passed by the members of the association, some of the Village Administrative Officers failed to produce their accounts for checking by participating the Jamabandhi meeting on 18.4.2000 without prior inspection of the accounts of the village concerned. As a result, many problems of the public coming from various villages could not be solved by the District Administration. In view of the above boycott observed by the Village Administrative Officers, the Revenue Divisional Officer, Trichy, Lalgudi and Musiri and all Tahsildars were instructed to take decision to deduct salary for April 2000 to the Village Administrative Officers who have not produced the accounts for Jamabandhi for Fasli 1409, particularly by taking into account the persons, who had not attended the Jamabandhi meeting in the office letter RC.C2/8529/2000 dated 27.4.2000. Aggrieved by the above said letter, the District Secretary of the Tamil Nadu Village Administrative Officers Association, Trichy District filed O.A. seeking a direction to the respondents not to deduct one days pay of the Village Administrative Officers.

3. Heard the learned counsel on either side.

4. When the petitioners association placed certain demands regarding their Service matters before the District Revenue Officer, Tiruchirappalli in the year 1998, the High level committee after considering the demands made by the members of the petitioners association, most of the reasonable demands were settled earlier except publication of the seniority list of Village Administrative Officers in Trichy District. Even that seniority list could not be published for the reason that particulars like name of individual, date of joining duty, community, native place, date of birth, educational qualifications etc., in respect of each Village Administrative Officer have to be collected from all the Tahsildars of the concerned District for the compilation of seniority list, and therefore the said demand could not be settled immediately. Hence in a meeting conducted by the District Revenue Officer, Tiruchirappalli on 14.9.98 with the office bearers of the petitioners association, assurance was given to complete the above work as early as possible. Accordingly, after getting the said details in respect of all the 453 Village Administrative Officers working in the District from the subordinate officers, the seniority list has been prepared and sent to Government branch press, Thuvakudi for printing and publication on 24.11.99. Thereafter, due to heavy work in the Government press, the seniority list was printed on 5.5.2000. The delay in publication of seniority list of Village Administrative Officers was due to various administrative reasons. Without considering the above aspects, the Village Administrative Officers have no right to boycot their legitimate duty of producing accounts for Jamabandhi on the dates fixed for