The Meghalaya High Court will tomorrow hear the appeal by the State government against the order by the single bench of the court which quashed the appointment of the new director of Printing and Stationery Department.
The division bench of the High Court comprising of Justice Ranjit More and Justice Wanlura Diengdoh will hear the writ appeal filed by the State government.
Earlier on September 17, Justice Hamarsan S. Thangkhiew had set aside and quashed the appointment of E D R Tariang as director of Printing and Stationery Department.
The single bench of the High Court passed the verdict following a writ petition filed by Salgira R. Marak.
Marak who was the director of Printing and Stationery Department was appointed as Officer on Special Duty (OSD) and the post of director was given to Tariang who was the joint director.
According to Justice Thangkhiew, the notifications regarding appointment of Tariang as director of Printing and Stationery Department as also the appointment of Marak as OSD were “unsustainable in law as being issued in violation of the statutory Rules”.
In its 19-page judgement, Justice Thangkhiew stated that the post of OSD is a newly created one and ‘is not borne in the cadre of the Printing & Stationery (Technical) Service Rules, 1995, and therefore is an ex-cadre post.
Justice Thangkhiew had also said in his judgement that the new post of OSD cannot be taken to be part of the strength of the service in the cadre of Printing and Stationery (Technical) service.
The judgement also said that the appointment of Marak as OSD can in no manner be termed to be ‘on deputation’ as the post was created personal to him as evidenced by the sanction for creation of the post and moreover no consent was ever obtained from him.
“The petitioner (Marak) has been sought to be appointed in the guise of a transfer, to a newly created post which is outside the cadre. However, in the instant case, no consent was sought from the petitioner and moreover he did not join to the post of OSD to enable the respondents (Government) to contend that there was tacit acceptance of the transfer beyond his cadre. Schedule 1 to the Rules, and the post mentioned therein clearly go to show that the posting or transfer was beyond the cadre in which the petitioner was selected,” the court had said.
However, the State government defied the order of the High Court by not bringing back Marak to his post as director.
