Point of Law: Service Law - Stepping up of pay - Appellant was not senior to said officers in post of Investigator, he is not entitled to stepping up of pay in terms of Rule 14(6) read with Rule 14(6B) of ROP Rules, 2009.

ORDER :

1. This intra-court appeal is directed against the judgment of the learned Single Judge dated 10.07.2020 delivered in W.P. (C) No. 1303 of 2017 titled as Bidyut Kumar Deb vs. State of Tripura and Another.

2. The appellant filed the writ petition challenging the memorandum dated 17.07.2017 [Annexure-7 to the writ petition] whereby the stepping up of pay as provided by the memorandum under No. F.1(171)/STAT/ESTT/99/4693-4694 dated 18.08.2015 has been recalled by observing as follows:

Whereas, stepping of pay of Smt. Aparna Sarkar and 3(three) others have been examined with reference to the Notification No. F.6(1)-FIN(PC)/2008 dated 23.07.2013. Para 6(b) of the Notification clearly mentioned that the stepping up of pay in the Pay Band/Grade Pay shall be done subject to the condition that both the senior and junior employees should borne in the same Cadre and the post under the same department with same line of promotion.

It has been provided that the so called junior officers got promotion earlier than that of the appellant by virtue of the accelerated promotion. As consequence thereof, under the rule of reservation, junior officers have become senior to the appellant or the similarly situated other employees. Therefore, stepping up of pay ought not have been provided under Para 6B of the Notification of Finance Department dated 23.07.2013. Having observed thus, the excess payment, made by that time, was directed to be recovered in monthly instalments.

3. The writ petition, challenging the directions in the memorandum dated 17.07.2017, was structured on the provision of Tripura State Civil Services [Revised Pay] Rules, 2009. Rule 14(6) is relevant and that has been relied by the petitioner in order to advance his challenge. The said rule provides for stepping up of pay. It has been provided under Rule 14(6) of ROP Rules, 2009 that ‘where pay of a junior become higher than that of his senior as result of providing the benefit of promotion followed by CAS-2 under TSCS (Revised Pay) Rules,1999 in comparison with his senior who was provided benefit of CAS-1 followed by promotion as per example cited below, the pay scale of the senior shall be stepped up to the higher pay scale provided to his junior from the same date junior got the higher pay.’ The example as cited below of that rule is as under:

“Example: On completion of 10 years of service as LDC without promotion a senior LDC in the Department first got CAS benefit (from pay scale of Rs. 3300-7100 to Rs. 4000-7890/-) and then got promotion to the post of UDC in the pay scale of Rs. 4200-8650/-. Under the provision of CAS he consumed two upgradations. On the other hand, his junior first got promotion to the post of UDC (Rs. 4200-8650/-) from the post of LDC (Rs. 3300-7100/-) and thereafter on completion of 7 years of service as UDC without promotion he got CAS-2 benefit and moved to the pay scale of Rs. 5000-10300/- taking analogy that he had consumed CAS-1 while getting promotion to the post of UDC and thereafter on completion of 7 years of service as UDC without any further promotion he got benefit of CAS-2 in the pay scale of Rs. 5000-10300/-. As a result, pay scale of the senior UDC in the same Department became lower than his junior. To remove this anomaly, the pay scale of the senior shall be stepped up to the pay scale of Rs. 5000-10300/- with re-fixation of pay notionally from the date of arising such anomaly but with financial benefit from 01.01.2009.”

4. Reading of the said example leads us to an understanding that the pay of the senior UDC in the same department became less than that of his juniors. To remove this anomaly the pay scale of the senior employee shall be stepped up in the pay scale of Rs. 5000-10300/- with fixation of pay notionally from the date of arising such anomaly but with financial benefit from 01.01.2009. On the basis of the said rule, by the memorandum dated 18.08.2015 [Annexure-3 to the writ petition] the appellant’s seniority in the grade of As