The main legal point established in the judgment is the requirement for fair and reasonable actions by the State Government in the appointment, renewal, and removal of DGC, following the principles laid down in the L.R. Manual and giving primacy to the opinion of the District Judge.

Tarun Agarwala, J.—The controversy regarding the appointments, renewal and removal of the District Government Counsel (hereinafter referred to as D.G.C. in short) has been the subject matter of several writ petitions over the last two decades and the reason is not far to see. In the last 20 years or so, the Government has changed hands half a dozen times. Whenever a Government changes or a new Government takes over, an effort is made to appoint Government counsel of their own choice. The appointments are not made on merit, but on the basis of political affiliations. While appointing their own, the new Government generally cancels the appointment or refuses to renew the appointment of the existing D.G.C. This has developed into an unhealthy practice and, time and again, this Court had been directing that meritorious appointments should be made and that the appointments should not be made on the basis of political affiliation or on the basis of caste or creed. The stand now taken by the Government is that the engagement of the Government counsel by previous Government was made on political and extraneous considerations and therefore, the engagement of these persons is no longer desirable. This may be true, but can this be used as a lever to remove all the DGCs en masse on the sole ground of political affiliations? In our view, every new Government has to tread cautiously. The Government has to examine each and every case individually and if after an enquiry, it is found that the person so engaged was politically affiliated, it may, in that case, cancel or refuse to renew his appointment. But, in no case, the renewal, cancellation or refusal to renew an appointment can be made on extraneous considerations. Each and every case has to be dealt with on merit.

2. In State of U.P. v. Johri Mal, 2004 (4) SCC 714, the Supreme Court held :

“The State, therefore, is not expected to rescind the appointments with the change in the Government. The existing panel of the District Government counsel may not be disturbed and a fresh panel come into being, only because a new party has taken over charge of the Government.”

3. It has been observed that the appointments of DGCs are not being renewed by not following the procedure laid down in the L.R. Manual and in most cases a perfunctory exercise is made in order to give legitimacy to the action taken. The Supreme Court in Johri Mal’s case (supra) held :

“The State is required to act fairly and reasonably. The State normally would be bound to follow the principles laid down in the L.R. Manual.”

4. Whenever the State fails to discharge its public duty or acts arbitrarily in defiance of the provisions of law, the Courts can always intervene exercising their powers of judicial review. The Supreme Court in Johri Mal’s case (supra) held :

“The action of the State in not renewing the tenure can be subjected to judicial scrutiny inter alia on the ground that the same is arbitrary.”

The Supreme Court further held that :

“Malice in law can also be a ground for judicial review.”

5. In Kumari Shrilekha Vidyarthi v. State of U.P. and others, AIR 1991 SC 537, the Supreme Court held that the appointment on the post of DGC is not contractual in nature and, the State could not act arbitrarily and that such arbitrary action was liable to be set aside on the ground of being violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India.

6. It is, therefore, clear that the State Government has to act fairly and reasonably with regard to the appointment, termination and renewal of the tenure of DGC and as held by the Supreme Court in Johri Mal’s case (supra) :

“The State normally would be bound to follow the principles laid down in the L.R. Manual.”

7. What exactly is the L.R. Manual ? The Supreme Court in Johri Mal’s case (supra) held :

“The LR’s Manual is merely a compilation of executive orders and is not a “law” within the meaning of Article 13 of the Constitution of India.”

8. Para 1.01 of the L.R. Manual states that it