The court upheld the government's order rectifying seniority to ensure fairness and compliance with constitutional principles.

1The petitioners respectively are working as Deputy Director of Collegiate Education, Kottayam and Principal, Government College, Elerithattu. The Original Petition has been filed praying that Ext. P10 order of the Government dated 10-03-2003 is to be set aside and the respondents are not to revise the seniority list of Selection Grade Lecturers, and for a declaration that respondents 3 to 14 are entitled to be placed in the seniority list of Selection Grade Lecturers only on the basis of their date of conferment of status of Senior Scale Lecturers, as per the UGC norms.

2By the impugned order, the Government had accorded sanction to refix the seniority of II Grade Professors, who are the said respondents. This was to the disadvantage of the petitioners. The seniority of the petitioners vis - a - vis the said respondents had been finally settled in 1995, However, a writ petition came to be filed by the third respondent, and certain directions came to be passed. As follow up procedure, Government had accorded sanction to refix the seniority. Though the petitioners had been appointed as Lecturers earlier than the said respondents, the latter group had gained a march over them because of a special recruitment envisaged under R.17A of the Kerala State and Subordinate Services Rules (hereinafter referred to KS & SSR) to the cadre of Professor Grade II (Cadre). The said position was prevailing when during 1990, the UGC Scheme came to be implemented. As the yardstick for conferment of grade was length of service, considering that the petitioners had longer service, they could get earlier placement as Senior Grade Lecturers and Selection Grade Lecturers, and this naturally reflected in the seniority list of 1995. According to the Government, the judgment authorised them to recast the seniority, taking notice of the seniority as arising from R.27(c) of the KS & SSR. The question is whether the Government was justified in giving such reliefs to the respondents concerned.

3There is no dispute about the facts of the case. The petitioners had joined service as Lecturers in Government Colleges on 15-09-1970 and 11-08-1972. The third respondent had joined service as Lecturer on 04-06-1973. In a special recruitment conducted in the year 1985 to the post of II Grade Professors, the third respondent had been selected as II Grade Professor. Vide advice memo dated 19-03-1985 he had joined duty on 17-06-1985. Respondents 4 to 15 are also similarly placed like the third respondent, who got such selection by way of special recruitment as II Grade Professors. The petitioners submit that in respect of respondents 10 to 15 [the name of the 10th respondent was deleted from the party array, as per order dated 4.11.2003 in I.A.No.14045/2003], they had however joined duty after 05-05-1986. The said date has relevance, since from 05-05-1986 UGC Scheme had been implemented in the State. But in the ultimate analysis, this circumstance has not much of significance. It is not disputed that after such selection, the said respondents had gained seniority over the petitioners, who had later come/to be promoted as II Grade Professors, by virtue of their service.

4The UGC Scheme was implemented only later, viz., 27-03-1990. The Scheme envisaged that placement was to be given to the teachers who opted UGC Scheme on the basis of their length of service. Normally a Lecturer was entitled to be placed as Senior Scale Lecturer after 8 years of service and as a Selection Grade Lecturer after rendering 8 years of service as Senior Scale Lecturer or by putting up a total service of 16 years. When a provisional integrated seniority list of Lecturers as on 13-03-1990 had been prepared, as per Ext. P3 the respondents found that notwithstanding the earlier promotions to the category of Second Grade Professors their names were positioned in places below their erstwhile juniors in the category. This resulted because of the reason that the petitioners could secure placement as Senior