Order

19/09/2024

1. Petitioner has preferred this Civil Writ Petition aggrieved by order dated 25.10.2021 passed by learned Central Administrative Tribunal, Jaipur Bench, Jaipur, whereas Original Application No.92/2013, preferred by the petitioner, was dismissed.

2. It is contended by counsel appearing for the petitioner that petitioner was working as Inspector with the Income Tax Department since 29.11.2001. One Shri Krishna Yadav was appointed as direct recruit on 28.11.2002. Since, petitioner was working as Inspector since November, 2001, he got two advance increments, however, when the revised pay scale came into existence in the year 2006, the pay of Shri Krishna Yadav became more than that of the present petitioner. Since, anomalies had arisen because of implementation of the 6th pay commission, a letter was written by the Under Secretary to the Government of India on 19.05.1999 to all Chief Commissioners of Income Tax for removal of anomalies in the revised pay scale. In pursuance thereof, vide order dated 08.10.2012, the Commissioner of Income Tax issued an order for stepping up the pay of the present petitioner with reference to the pay of his junior Shri Krishna Yadav. It is contended that in the order itself, it was mentioned that the order has been passed in view of Board’s letter dated 19.05.1999 and Note 7 of Rule 7 of Central Civil Services (Revised Pay) Rules, 2008.

3. It is also contended that petitioner’s pay was fixed equivalent to Shri Krishna Yadav w.e.f. 18.10.2006 i.e. the date from which he was drawing higher basic pay than the present petitioner. It is contended that thereafter, when petitioner claimed the stepping up amount, an office objection was made by the Zonal Accounts Officer and since the same was made, the petitioner challenged the said objection before the CAT. It is also contended that CAT has erred in rejecting the application filed by the petitioner. It is further contended that order dated 08.10.2012 was rightly passed by the Authorities in pursuance of the Board’s letter and Note 7 of Rule 7 of CCS (Revised Pay) Rules, 2008, which has not been withdrawn till date. It is contended that F.R. 22 is not applicable, as this is a special case and anomalies had arisen because of the implementation of the 6th Pay Commission in the year 2006.

4. Counsel appearing for the respondents have opposed the present Civil Writ Petition. It is contended that the Tribunal has dealt with the issues now raised before this Court and has come to the conclusion that petitioner is not entitled to the fixation as done by the order dated 08.10.2012. It is also contended that order dated 08.10.2012 was an order passed under F.R. 27. It is argued that F.R. 27 is not applicable and F.R. 22 is applicable. As per F.R. 22, petitioner is not entitled to stepping up and stepping up can take place only once during the career and petitioner has already availed one stepping up.

5. Counsel appearing for the respondents have placed reliance on “Union of India & Anr. vs. R. Swaminathan & Ors.” (1997) 7 Supreme Court Cases 690 and “Union of India & Ors. vs.

M. Suryanarayana Rao” ( 1998 ) 6 Supreme Court Cases 400.

6. We have considered the contentions.

7. It would be appropriate to first deal with the judgments referred to by the counsel for the respondents. “Union of India & Anr. vs. R. Swaminathan & Ors.” (supra) was a case where juniors officiating in promotional posts on account of their local ad hoc promotion while seniors not so officiating before their regular promotion. “Union of India & Ors. vs. M. Suryanarayana Rao” (supra) was a case, where juniors were getting more pay than the senior on account of junior’s ad hoc promotion within the circle to which he belonged, while the senior who belonged to a different circle was not considered or was not offered ad hoc promotion.

8. Factually, both these cases have no applicability to the facts of the present case. Present is a clear case where due to implementation of the revised pay