JUDGMENT :

PUSHPA SATHYANARAYANA, J.

(Prayer: Appeal filed under Clause XV of Letters Patent, against the common order dated 10.04.2019 made in W.P (MD) No. 8620 of 2019.)

1. The 1st respondent herein had filed a Writ of Mandamus, directing the appellants to count half of the services rendered by him, as Plot Watcher from 20.04.1983 to 06.08.2009, when he was on temporary basis, along with the regular service from 07.08.2009, till the date of his retirement, namely, 28.02.2019, as qualifying service, for the purpose of computing pension.

2. The Writ Court had directed to count 50% of the service of the writ petitioner, when he was working on temporary basis and calculated the service from the date of regularisation till his date of retirement.

3. Subsequently, there was a Full Bench judgment of this Court in Government of Tamilnadu vs. R.Kaliyamoorthy, reported in (2019) 6 CTC 705, in which, it has been held that as far as the appointments made on or before 01.04.2003, is concerned, 50% of the services rendered by the employees, on temporary basis, should be taken into consideration and insofar as the appointments made on or after 01.04.2003 is concerned, since the said appointees are governed by the new contributory pension scheme, 50% of the services rendered by them, on temporary basis, need not be taken into consideration, for the purpose of calculating pension.

4. The Writ Court had followed the Division Bench judgment of this Court in Government of Tamil Nadu and others vs. K.Sakthivel and another [W.A.No.51 of 2018 etc., batch, dated 27.03.2018] and allowed the writ petition. On appeal, the learned Special Government Pleader would point out that as per the dictum laid down by the Hon'ble Full Bench, referred supra, the Government servants, who were appointed on or after 01.04.2003, and absorbed in the regular service after 01.04.2003, will not be entitled to count half of their past services, for the purpose of determination of qualifying service for pension.

5. Admittedly, in this case, though the 1st respondent was appointed as Plot Watcher on 20.04.1983, his services were regularised only on 07.08.2009, and therefore, he will not be entitled for counting 50% of the services, for the purpose of calculating pension. It is also to be noted that the writ petitioner has not challenged the belated regularisation. Almost after 30 years, only after his superannuation, he is seeking 50% of his services to be calculated, for the purpose of computing pension. In this regard, the subsequent Division Bench in The State of Tamil Nadu and others vs. B.Devadoss and another [W.A.No.153 of 2019], where one of us, is a party, has held as follows:-

6.3. However, before parting with this case, it would not be out of place to mention here that we have come across many instances, where, the State had the practice to regularize the employees only at the fag end of their career, i.e. two years or three years before when the employee is about to retire from service. After extracting work from the employees for one or two decades, regularising their service on the verge of their retirement would not benefit the employees in any way, and by doing so, the employees would obviously lose their entire terminal benefits, which is their hard earned money by sweat of the brow. We further noticed that the State had the practice of reckoning 50% of the temporary service rendered by the employees for the purpose of computing pensionary benefits, only when the aggrieved employees are coming before the Court craving for justice and obtaining orders from the Court. We rebuke such practice. We still have a ray of hope that State would take care of its employees, at least in the womb of time by providing all the benefits, to which, they are legally entitled to, inasmuch as, the State is functioning only for the well being of its people.''

6. Though we have expressed our anguish, we are unable to help the 1st respondent, as he had not challenged the order of regularis