New Delhi, December 8
By a judgement affecting promotions and seniority of a number of middle-level officers of the Jammu and Kashmir police, the Supreme Court has set aside the state government’s 22-year-old order which placed directly recruited sub-inspectors and those promoted to the rank from ASIs on the same footing for drawing a common list of promotion.

Since the Jammu and Kashmir High Court had in 2005 ordered redrawing of the seniority list as most of the SIs had risen to the rank of DSPs or SP, which had placed the promoted officers above the directly recruited ones, the apex court also set aside the impugned judgement, declaring it a “bad law”.

The case had turned into a long-drawn legal battle between the directly recruited SIs and those promoted to the rank from ASIs with retrospective effect by a common order issued by the state on December 3, 1985.

A Bench of Justices S. B. Sinha and J. M. Panchal found the government order of December 1985 discriminatory against directly recruited SIs and said, “If it was read with an earlier order of August 1,1985, the intention of the government to favour promotee officers becomes explicit.”

The apex court agreed with senior advocate P. S. Patwalia, appearing for the officers directly recruited in 1979 as SIs, that the high court order had virtually put the promoted officers above the direct appointees in the seniority list.

But the court was considerate enough to protect the benefits drawn by the wrongly promoted officers issuing a specific direction under its discretionary power that the “monetary benefits conferred upon them may not be recovered”.

This was done by taking a compassionate view for the service rendered by them till date as the wrong promotions were not due to their fault.