Delhi High Court seeks assistance of Attorney General R Venkataramani in case challenging appointment of Judicial Assistants

The Delhi High Court has sought the assistance of Attorney General for India R Venkataramani in adjudicating a plea challenging the appointment of nearly 50 Junior Judicial Assistants to the High Court allegedly in violation of law [Meenakshi Chaudhary and Ors v Delhi High Court the Registrar General and Ors]..In an order passed on August 22, a division bench of Justices Manmohan and Mini Pushkarna said that the issue raises serious constitutional and administrative issues and therefore asked the Attorney General to assist the Court as amicus curiae.“This Court requests the learned Attorney General of India to assist this Court. Accordingly, Registry is directed to forward a copy of the paper book to the learned Attorney General of India with a request to assist this Court as an amicus curiae on the next date of hearing,” the Court said.The Bench also directed that the original file regarding all the minutes of the selection committee to be placed on regard. It then granted the High Court liberty to file additional affidavits and listed the case for further hearing on September 21..The Court was hearing a petition filed by a group of serving Delhi High Court employees challenging the appointment of nearly 50 Junior Judicial Assistants as well as the order dated October 16, 2018, November 17, 2018, and November 29, 2018.It was stated that these Junior Judicial Assistants were appointed as Data Entry Operators on contractual basis in 2012 for a period of only one year and on the condition that they will not have a right to claim regularisation.However, they were then appointed/regularized in the post of Junior Judicial Assistants (Data Entry) Ex-Cadre in violation of the Recruitment Rules of the said post through orders of October 16, 2018 and November 17, 2018.The petitioner contended that this regularisation was not in accordance with law and was contrary to the order of the Supreme Court in the case of Renu v District and Sessions Judge, Tis Hazari. It was also submitted that the respondents during their contractual service had submitted representations for regularization of their services on various occasions, which were rejected by the selection committee in 2014 and 2016 and those decisions attained finality. It was informed that the earlier representations for the respondents were rejected by the Selection Committee of the Court and the decision attained finality as they were approved by the then Chief Justice of the High Court.The Court was further told that the Information Technology Committee (IT committee) of the High Court considered a fresh representation of the respondents and on March 7, 2018 recommended their regularisation. However, the subject matters of recruitment and regularization of this Court is under the ambit of the selection committee and not of the IT committee and that IT committee did not take account of the previous decisions of the select committee, it was stated..The Counsel appearing for the High Court, however, challenged the maintainability of the plea and said that it is in the nature of a public interest litigation (PIL).The counsel argued that services were regularized by exercise of power under Rule 12 of the Delhi High Court Establishment (Appointment and Condition of Service) Rules, 1972, by relaxation, as a one-time measure considering the administrative exigencies.It was argued that the data entry operators were regularized in a newly created ex-cadre post of Junior Judicial Assistant (Data Entry) for which no Recruitment Rules have been prescribed and that the recommendation of the IT committee was placed before the then acting Chief Justice for consideration and was approved..Advocates Amita Singh Kalkal, Aditi Gupta and Devrat Pradhan appeared for the petitioners.The Delhi High Court was represented by advocate Gautam Narayan.Senior Advocate C Mohan Rao along with advocates Lokesh Kr Sharma, Prasanna S, Swati Arya and Yuvraj Singh Rathore appeared for the respondent Junior Judicial Assistants. .[Read Order]