SURYA KANT, J.

This order shall dispose of the above-captioned writ petitions as the common question of law raised in the cases is whether the employees of Government owned and controlled Boards/Corporations are entitled to be treated as the employees serving in connection with the affairs of the State of Punjab and/or serving under the Government? And if so, whether such employees are eligible for appointment to Punjab Civil Service (Executive Branch) through ‘Register-C’ of the Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch) (Class-I) Rules, 1976?

2. The facts are being extracted from CWP No.10437 of 2014.

3. The three petitioners are employees of Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (for brevity, ‘PSPCL’) while petitioner Nos.1 and 2 are working as Assistant Engineers, petitioner No.3 is working as Private Secretary to the Director (Finance).

4. The petitioners have averred that the Punjab State Electricity Board was constituted under the Electricity (Supply) Act, 1948 (for brevity, ‘the 1948 Act’). The said Act has since been repealed by the Electricity Act, 2003. In conformity with the new legislation, the Punjab State Electricity Board was dissolved and has been bifurcated i