Sir / Mam,
My wife joined Primary Education Department, Himachal Pradesh as Volunteer Teacher in January, 1992 alongwith other around 6000 candidates. These candidates, after imparting special training certificate by the govt. of Himachal Pradesh, were regularised on 01-08-1998 collectively.
Since the date of joining of all the candidates on the date of regularisation i.e. 01-08-1998 is the same for all the 6000 candidates and at the same time there was no other selection critaria or merit (because these candidates were already working as volunteer teachers) hence fixation of seniority has to be on the basis of date of birth / the senior most in age is preferred as senior among all the candidates within one district (being district cadre). That means a person born on 01-01-1960 must be given preference / priority in the seniority list than a person who is born on 01-04-1960. But while fixing the seniority, the department did not follow this principle and fixed the seniority on mixed basis.
Sir, I seek your legal opinion in context with CCA & CCS rules of Govt. of H.P. and Apex Court / High Court orders in this regard. Kindly guide me thoroughly.
I would like to mention here that the Guidelines issued by Department of Personnel & Training (Govt. of India) vide notification DoP&T’s O.M. No.20011/1/2008-Estt.(D) Dated 11th November 2010 titled "Instructions and Guidelines on Seniority" are silent on this point.
Please guide.
