Point of Law : If appointment itself is in infraction of rules, such an illegality cannot be regularized. Ratification or regularization is possible of an act which is within power and province of authority.

JUDGMENT:

Sri Raghvendra Singh Chauhan, J.

The appellants are aggrieved by the common order dated 05.10.2021, passed by learned Single Judge, in Writ Petition No. 925 (S/S) of 2021, and batch matter, whereby the learned Single Judge had dismissed the writ petitions.

2) Briefly, the facts of the case are that by advertisement dated 25.08.2020, applications were invited by the respondent No. 5, Multi-purpose Kisan Seva Sahkari Samiti Limited, for appointment on the post of Assistant Accountant, on contractual basis. The petitioners applied for the same. By Resolution dated 21.09.2020, the petitioners were duly appointed to the said post. Subsequently, the Resolution dated 21.09.2020, was forwarded by the Assistant District Co-operative Officer to the District Assistant Registrar Co-operative Societies. It was further forwarded to the Registrar Co-operative Societies. The Registrar Co-operative Societies also approved all the appointments. Consequently, the petitioners were issued appointment orders on 25.09.2020 by the respondent No. 5. The petitioners claimed that they joined the respondent No. 5 on 15.01.2021. According to the petitioners, they were discharging their duties to the best of their abilities. Vide Resolution dated 28.12.2020, it was resolved that the petitioners’ services, in fact, should be regularized against substantive and vacant post. The said resolution was equally approved by the Registrar Co-operative Societies. Therefore, by the appointment order dated 15.01.2021, the petitioners were, in fact, granted regular appointments. However, certain complaints were made by the ex-Chairman of the Society with regard to the recruitment process. Therefore, vide order dated 29.06.2021, the Registrar Co-operative Societies directed that not only the petitioners should be removed from their services, but even their appointment should be set aside. Consequently, the order dated 29.06.2021, was forwarded by the District Assistant Registrar Co-operative Societies to the Management Committee. Since the petitioners were aggrieved by this twin orders dated 29.06.2021 and 03.07.2021, they filed a batch of writ petitions before the learned Single Judge. As mentioned hereinabove, by the common order, the learned Single Judge dismissed the writ petitions. Hence, this appeal before this Court.

3) Mr. Ajay Veer Pundir, the learned counsel for the petitioners-appellants has raised the following contentions before this Court :-

Firstly, that once the appointment was approved by the Registrar Co-operative Societies, the Registrar Co-operative Societies could not have set aside the same set of appointment.

Secondly, the impugned orders have been passed behind the back of the petitioners, and without giving an opportunity of hearing to the petitioners. Therefore, their rights under the principles of natural justice have been violated.

Thirdly, neither of these facts had been noticed by the learned Single Judge while passing the impugned order. Therefore, the impugned order deserves to be set aside by this Court.

4) Heard the learned counsel for the appellants and perused the impugned order.

5) A bare perusal of the impugned order clearly reveals that the learned Single Judge has elaborately discussed the facts of the case. The learned Single Judge has noticed that by Notification dated 16.10.2018, the entire process for recruitment was prescribed. In cases of substantive vacancies, the Management Committee was required to forward the proposal for filling up the vacancies to the District Assistant Registrar Co-operative Societies. Being satisfied with the proposal, the District Assistant Registrar Co-operative Societies was to forward the proposal to the Registrar Co-operative Societies along with his / her recommendations. It is only after receiving an approval from the Registrar Co-operative Societies that the vacancies were supposed to be published in the local newspaper.

6) Moreover, under the said Notification, it is imperative that the adve