HC regularises services of 84-year-old

Saurabh Malik
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, October 18

It’s justice at last for octogenarian Shanti Devi. Appointed on part-time basis in a Sangrur school more than 40 years ago, her services have been ordered to be regularised at the age of 84 by the Punjab and Haryana High Court, making her, perhaps, the oldest serving employee.

She, along with two other petitioners, had moved the court at the age of 80 for directions to the State of Punjab and other respondents to regularise their services. During the course of hearing, the services of one of the petitioners were regularised, leaving just the two to fend for themselves.

Appearing before Justice Jitendra Chauhan’s Bench, their counsel CS Bagri submitted Shanti Devi was compelled to discharge duties at her age due to extreme poverty. She continued all these years with a fond hope that her services would be regularised. Her date of birth, as per her Aadhaar card, was January 1, 1934.

Going into the background of the matter, Bagri submitted she was appointed part-time “Kuhar” on October 1, 1977, at Government Senior Secondary School, Khanori Kalan, Sangrur. The Department of Personnel issued a policy circular dated March 4, 1999, to regularise the services of Class-IV employees working on part-time basis in compliance with a Division Bench judgment.

Subsequently, the District Education Officer issued a letter to the principals and headmasters of all schools to send cases of part-time employees for regularisation of services. In compliance to the correspondence, their names were conveyed to the DEO, but the matter was still pending consideration.

Bagri also told the Bench that the petitioner had been getting monthly salary of Rs 2,250 since 2012. The services of certain part-time class-IV employees, juniors to the petitioners, were regularised in November, 2012. They were, as of now, getting higher salary than the petitioners.

The state counsel, on the other hand, argued Shanti Devi attained the age of superannuation on December 31, 1989. Till that time, her turn for regularisation did not come as per the seniority position. After hearing arguments, Justice Chauhan asserted concededly the petitioners were getting meagre salary and their claim for regularisation had been pending since long. Since they were working for the past so many years, the requirement of the posts was evident.

Rejecting the state’s stand that a number of similarly situated persons were still awaiting regularisation for want of vacancies, Justice Chauhan asserted it could not be accepted as gospel truth. “The court feels that it is a fit case where there is a requirement for creation of full-time regular posts on which petitioners are currently working as part-time employees….” Setting three-month deadline for the purpose, Justice Chauhan added they were fully eligible for regularisation.