KARACHI, Aug 22: Another FST bench, comprising its chairman, justice Amanullah Abbasi (retired), and member Mohammad Iqbal Khan, meanwhile, set aside the dismissal of a Pakistan International Airlines employee and ordered his demotion to the next lower post for three years instead.
The case against Shaukat Ali Bhand, former Pax Service supervisor at the airport, was that he absented himself without leave for about two months and a half. He was issued a ‘notice for personal hearing’ under Section 5 (4) of the Removal from Service Ordinance, 2000. His explanation that he could not resume his duty in response to the directions received from the PIA office concerned due to his mother’s illness and that he subsequently informed the office and applied for regularization of his leave along with his mother’s medical certificate were rejected and he was ordered removed from service. He approached the FST through Advocate M. Nawaz Shaikh.
While emphasizing the importance of discipline in ‘government organizations’, the bench observed that the penalty of dismissal was too excessive to be warranted by the offence committed by the appellant. More importantly, the dismissal order suffered from a legal infirmity in that he was not issued a show cause notice as required by Section 3 (2) of the Removal from Service Ordinance. A notice for personal hearing was no substitute for a show cause notice followed by inquiry, particularly when disputed questions of fact were involved.
Modifying the dismissal order to that of demotion, the bench directed the PIA to treat the intervening period ‘as leave due (to the appellant) of any kind’.
PROMOTION CASE: The Federal Service Tribunal directed the establishment division on Saturday to reconvene the central selection board (CSB) within three months to reconsider a Grade-19 income tax department officer for promotion to Grade 20 with effect from Sept 2003 under intimation to it.
The officer, Manzoor Hussain Kureshi, was selected in the income tax group in 1978 after qualifying the central superior services examination. He earned promotions to Grade-19 during 26 years of service, in the course of which he also officiated as an income tax commissioner in Grade-20. His case for promotion from Grade-19 to 20 came up for consideration before the board but the board rejected it as ‘he did not enjoy good reputation for integrity and honesty’. Twelve Grade-19 officers junior to him were, meanwhile, promoted.
The officer’s representation against his ‘supersession’ was rejected by the establishment division as ‘according to Section 22 (2) of the Civil Servants Act read with the rules framed under the Act, no appeal or representation was competent in matters relating to determination of fitness of a person to a particular post or promotion’. He challenged the rejection before the FST through Advocate Mansoorul Haq Solangi.
The issues thrown up by the counsel for the appellant officer and the respondent division were whether promotion was a civil servant’s vested right? Whether an appeal against denial of promotion was maintainable under the Service Tribunals Act and the Civil Servants Act and in view of ‘the best of the best’ policy adopted for selection posts? And whether the CSB duly considered the appellant for promotion and rightly decided to reject him for ‘not enjoying an A+ reputation for integrity and honesty’?
Citing a number of Supreme Court and tribunal judgments, a bench comprising, FST members Abdul Razzaque and Nazar Mohammad Shaikh, held that promotion was a vested right and every civil servant has a legitimate expectancy to graduate to higher echelons; that a decision regarding fitness for promotion should be taken by an objective process; and that the tribunal has jurisdiction to ensure that the selection/promotion board has decided promotion cases strictly in conformity with the law, rules, policy and government instructions.
As for the appellant’s fitness, the FST bench observed that he had put in 26 years of unblemished service. There is nothing on record to substantiate the vague assertion that he did not enjoy a good reputation in respect of his integrity and honesty.
