1. The petitioner, who was working as Deputy Ranger in the respondent-department, had retired from the said service on attaining the age of superannuation way back on 30.4.2001. His grievance is that though vacancy in the promotional cadre of Range Forest Officers (Forest Rangers) became available on 1.1.1999, yet the department failed to convene a meeting of the Departmental Promotion Committee (DPC) well within time, i.e during March/April, 1999, March/April, 2000 and March/April, 2001, in violation of the instructions contained in the Hand Book of Personnel Matters, copies of which have been brought on record as Annexures A-8, A-9, A-10 and A-11, with the result that the petitioner ultimately retired without being considered for promotion on 30.4.2001.
2. According to the petitioner, it was incumbent upon the department to hold DPC strictly in accordance with the aforesaid instructions and failure to do so has resulted in grave injustice to him. In this regard, reliance has been placed on the law laid down by the Honble Supreme Court in Union of India and others vs. N.R. Banerjee and others, (1997) 9 Supreme Court Cases 287, paras 10 and 11 of the judgment being relevant are extracted below for the sake of convenience:-
10. D.P.C. in the present case was directed to consider the cases of all the eligible candidates within the zone of consideration so that there will not be any heart burning among the eligible persons whose claims have been withheld for consideration for promotion to the higher post. In Syed Khalid Rizvi vs. Union of India the mandatory duty of the preparation of the select list of the officers for promotion to the All India Services has been indicated in para 35 of the judgment at page 605 thus:
"We, therefore, hold that preparation of the select list every year is mandatory. It would subserve the object of the Act and the rules and afford an equal opportunity to the promotee officers to reach higher echelons of the service. The dereliction of the statutory duty must satisfactorily be accounted for by the State Government concerned and this Court takes serious note of wanton infraction".
11. It would thus be seen that the claims of the candidates eligible have to be considered for promotion objectively and dispassionately, with a sense of achieving many-fold purpose (1) affording an opportunity to an incumbent to improve excellence, honesty, integrity, devotion to public duty; (2) inculcating discipline in service; (3) afford opportunity to every eligible officer within zone of consideration for promotion to higher post or officer; and (4) ensuing that the Committee regularly meets and considers their claim objectively, impartially with high sense of responsibility in accordance with the procedure and finalisation of the list in advance so as to fill up vacancies arising in the year from the approved panel without any undue delay. They are the salutory principles, purpose and the policy behind the above rules and the Government should follow them.
3. Reliance has also been placed on Union of India and another vs. Hemraj Singh Chauhan and others, (2010) 4 Supreme Court Cases 290, wherein the Honble Apex Court has held as under in paras 35, 36 and 38:-
35. The Court must keep in mind the constitutional obligation of both the a appellants/Central Government as also the State Government. Both the Central Government and the State Government are to act as model employers, which is consistent with their role in a welfare State.
36. It is an accepted legal position that the right of eligible employees to eb considered f or promotion is virtually a part of their fundamental right guaranteed under Article 16 of the Constitution. The guarantee of a fair consideration in matters of promotion under Article 16 virtually flows from guarantee of quality under Article 14 of the Constitution. 38. It is, therefore, clear that legitimate expectations of the respondents of being considered for promotion have been defeated by the acts of the Government and if not of the Central Government, certainly the unreasonable inaction on the part of the Government of State of Uttar Pradesh stood in the way of the respondents chances of promotion from being fairly considered when it is due for such consideration and delay has made them ineligible for such consideration. Now the question which is weighing on the conscience of this Court is how to fairly resolve this controversy.
4. The stand on behalf of the respondents is that the DPC could not be held in time due to administrative reasons and the executive instructions relied upon on behalf of the petitioner are not binding on the Government. However, such like contention did not find favour with the Honble Apex Court in P.N. Premchandran vs. State of Kerala and others, (2004) 1 Supreme Court Cases 245, wherein it has been held as under vide paras 4 and 7 of the judgment:-
4. The State of Kerala in its counter affidavit stated that since there was an administrative delay in conducting the D.P.C, Rule 31 (a) (i) of the Rules was resorted to for temporarily promoting the Departmental candidates and they were promoted as Assistant Director on a temporary basis under the said rules pending convening of the D.P.C. The D.P.C. was convened on 5.7.1984 and the promotions made from the year 1964 to 1980 were regularized with effect from 1964.
7. It is not in dispute that the posts were to be filled up by promotion. We fail to understand how the appellant, keeping in view the facts and circumstances of this case, could question the retrospective promotion granted to the private respondents herein. It is not disputed that in view of the administrative lapse, the Departmental Promotion Committee did not hold a sitting from 1964 to 1980. The respondents cannot suffer owing to such administrative lapse on the part of the State of Kerala for no fault on their part. It is also not disputed, that in ordinary course they were entitled to be promoted to the post of Assistant Directors, in the event, a Departmental Promotion Committee had been constituted in due time. In that view of the matter, it must be held that the State of Kerala took a conscious decision to the effect that those who have been acting in a higher post for a long time, although on a temporary basis, but were qualified at the time when they were so promoted and found to be eligible by the Departmental Promotion Committee at a later date, should be promoted with retrospective effect.
5. Admittedly, the petitioner has since retired from service in April, 2001. It being so, He can now only be considered for promotion on notional basis.
6. In view of the above, the petition is disposed of with a direction to the respondents/competent authority to consider the case of the petitioner for promotion to the post of Forest Ranger against an existing vacancy in accordance with law within three months from the date of production of copy of this judgment by the petitioner. It goes without saying that in case the petitioner is considered for promotion favourably, consequential benefits, if any, would follow.
7. The petition as also pending CMPs, if any, stand disposed of in the above terms.