Sarthak Kanjilal & John Wilbert
Port Blair, Feb 04: Nowadays the Electricity Department remains in news not only for its inability to provide regular power supply to its consumers but also because of the case of regular appointment of 20 JEs in the department, which was done by former Lieutenant Governor Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Bhopinder Singh by relaxing the RRs in exercise of the powers held by him.
The appointment of these JEs were challenged in the Hon’ble CAT by 2/3 individuals and the Hon’ble CAT passed orders setting aside the appointment of these 20 JEs vide order dated 27.07.2015, stating that as per RR of this post, the Lt. Governor can relax the provisions of RRs only with the concurrence of the UPSC.
It is unfortunate that the A & N Administration could not defend the action taken by its administrator which could have been defended quite easily by producing the fact that the post of Junior Engineer is a Group B Non Gazetted post and consultation with UPSC is not required.
But due to error on the part of administration, such clause for consultation was included in the RRs wrongly whereas no such provision exists in the same post available in other department like APWD etc.
It was incumbent SE Electricity’s assigned duties to bring such mistakes to the knowledge of administration and submit proposal for amendment to the RRs for the post of JEs to remove such provision which appears to have crept in due to clerical errors.
It is surprising that the SE Electricity instead of taking action for amendment of RR and defending the action of the administrator, every now and then approached the A & N Administration to implement the order dated 27.7.2015 of the Hon’ble CAT, giving false statement that there will be contempt of court if the ordered dated 27.7.2015 is not implemented fully aware that the matter is sub-judice, following the filing of RA against the order dated 27.07.2015.
The fact remains that the affected 20 JEs did file a review application in The CAT within the allowed period against the order dated 27.7.2015 and the Review Application has been accepted as such the matter is pending adjudication the CAT.
Moreover against a miscellaneous application filed by the JEs in the CAT, an order dated 03.1.2018 was passed that any action by the A & N Administration against the CAT order dated 27.7.2015 will be subject to the outcome of RA filed in The CAT.
The administrative Knowledge of the SE Electricity is again in question when it is clear that any action on the order dated 27.7.2015 of Hon’ble CAT which includes filling up 37 vacancies of JEs.
These 37 posts include 20 posts held by these petitioners whose appointment is pending for final decision in the CAT. The Electricity department may invite hundreds or thousands of litigations if the 20JEs succeed in their appointment case which was declared null and void by the due to a clerical error in the RR by the dept.
It is now for A & N Administration to wait for the final decision of the court on the appointment of these 20 JEs or go ahead with the filling up of 37 post of JEs said to be regular vacancies by SE Electricity which was already found incorrect by the Administration vide letter dated 3rd April 2012.
It is not out of place to mention here that the Electricity Department is not doing any good for the morale of these 20 JEs who are still serving in this department at various Islands.
Meanwhile, the Member of Parliament, Andaman & Nicobar Administration Mr Bishnu Pada Ray has also written a letter to the Lt Governor, Andaman & Nicobar Administration to review the decision for termination of the services of Junior Engineers, Electricity Department in the light of the interim direction passed by the Hon’ble CAT in a RA No.351/000936/2017 and MA No.351/996/2017 against the Order of the Hon’ble CAT dated 27.07.2015 passed in OA No. 135/AN/2012147/2012 & O.A No. 26/AN/21013. In this entire case one can now only hope that better sense will prevail in this matter in coming days.
