Letter to the Hon'ble Prime Minister

NATIONAL FEDERATION OF CGST EXECUTIVE OFFICERS
Chief Advisor S.K. PATIL	President ANUBHUTI CHATTERJEE	Secretary General R. MANIMOHAN
National Council Members IRS (IDT) OA :     Varsha Kolhatkar,  B.A.Chakravarthi, Anand Jagtiani, Biju Paul AIACEGEO   :      Sanjay Srinivasan,  Tirthankar Pyne, Shishir Agnihotri, K.G. Ajit Kumar,                                Virender Singh Thakur. AICEIA          :      P.P.Gupta, Laxman Chaurasia, Manoj Kumar Yadav, Kumar Rahul,                              Mahesh Kumar Kaler.

Ref. No. 06/2018                                                                                         Date: 27.12.2018

To

Shri. Narendra Modiji,

Hon’ble Prime Minister of India,

New Delhi.

Respected Pradhanmanthriji,

Sub: Request for kind intervention to end age old practice of discrimination against Government Employees in legal matters – reg

We seek to bring to your kind attention an age old practice of discrimination against Government employees in matters of application of judicial decisions on service matters.  This has been happening all along, in spite of claims of all earlier Governments as Socialist and welfare oriented.

2.       Whenever there is a decision by the judiciary, which has been accepted by the Government of India, and when it is in respect of interpretation of statue, rules or Government circulars, it is only expected that the said decision should be implemented for all similarly placed officials, since it is the law of the land.  This becomes imperative particularly when a matter is settled by the highest judicial forum viz., the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India, in respect of interpretations. 

3.       As revenue officials, we follow this dictum in respect of application of law to the assessees.  We do not take a stand that a matter gets settled only if each and every assessee goes to the highest judicial forum and gets the matter settled in their favour.  Judicial discipline does not permit such a narrow application.

4.1.    However, when it comes to matters pertaining to the service conditions of the Government Employees, the DOPT, Department of Expenditure and Ministry of Law and Justice appear to be applying a different yardstick. 

4.2.    Whenever there is a favourable judgement in respect of interpretation of rules, statue or circular, for a Government employee or a set of Government employees, the above said departments/Ministry invariably gets into an exercise of calculating the revenue that will be involved in implementing the said judgment for all similarly placed employees.  And on the grounds of revenue involved, they delay implementation of the said decision to all similarly placed officials or put it on hold for an endless period in time.

4.3.    This tendency forces each and every similarly placed person to again litigate on a settled matter, just to get it applied for oneself.  This becomes a huge burden on the individual, the administration as well as the judiciary.

4.4.    We would like to bring to your kind notice that such litigations, particularly which affect entire cadres or section of employees are fought in the courts in the name of one or a few individuals, but funded by almost all those who would stand to gain by the decision.  This is because, one individual or a group of Government Servants will not be able to fund the exorbitant cost involved in taking the matter from a Tribunal up to the Apex Court, which could run into lakhs of rupees with minimum number of hearings in each forum. 

4.5.    Thus, forcing each and every Government Servant to approach the judiciary even when a matter has been upheld in a judicial process and accepted by the Government, amounts to frustrating judicial discipline in service matters. This could also induce indirect corrupt practices.

4.6.    In this context, the Hon’ble Apex Court had mentioned as below in Diary No. 23663/2017 dated 1.9.2017 in SLP IA No. 77457/2017 in the matter of Government of India Vs. Somvir Rana & Ors:

“Once the question, in principle, has been settled, it is only appropriate on the part of the Government of India to issue a Circular so that it will save the time of the Court and the Administrative Department apart from avoiding unnecessary and avodiable expenditure”.

4.7.    However, the DOPT is yet to issue any OM on the above lines, till date.

5.       Hence, taking into consideration that when application of judicial decisions in revenue matters in rem costs the exchequer much more than in service matters, in the interest of equality and equity, it is requested that instructions may kindly be issued from your esteemed office that judicial decisions in respect of service matters where interpretation of statue, rules, circulars, etc is involved in arriving at the decision, such decisions should be applied to all similarly placed employees in rem.

Thanking your good self, in anticipation.

Yours truly,

(R. Manimohan)

Secretary General

Copy submitted to:

Shri. Arun Jaitleyji,

Hon’ble Union Minister for Finance,

North Block, New Delhi.

(R. Manimohan)

Secretary General