S. B. MAJMUDAR, J. - (1.) THE State of Tamil Nadu and Director of Agriculture, Madras as common appellants have brought in challenge a common judgment rendered by Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal in two Original Applications filed by the contesting respondents who are working as Deputy Agricultural Officers in the Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Subordinate Service under the Agriculture Department of the said State. THE Tribunal by its impugned common judgment in these two original applications has taken the view that the contesting respondents are entitled to get the same pay scale as available to Agricultural Officers working in Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Service as according to the Tribunal both these categories of employees perform the same type of work and carry out the same type of duties. Consequently on the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work the appellant-State must maintain parity of pay scales between these two groups of employees working in its Agriculture Department. THE Tribunal has also directed that the contesting respondents be paid all arrears with effect from 1/06/1988.
(2.) ON grant of special leave to appeal under Article 136 of the Constitution of India the appellants have preferred these appeals. During the pendency of these appeals by an interim order of this Court the impugned judgment and order of the Tribunal have remained stayed. In order to appreciate the grievance of the respondents which appealed to the Tribunal, it is necessary to note a few introductory facts leading to these proceedings. The respondents herein were originally appointed in the Agriculture Department of the State as Fieldman. They belonged to Tamil Nadu Agricultural Subordinate Service. They were subsequently promoted to the posts of Deputy Agriculral Officers. These could be filed in by promoting Assistant Agricultural Officers. There is no higher avenue of promotion for the respondents beyond the promotional posts of Deputy Agricultural Officers. On the other hand Agricultural Officers are being directly recruited from open market and they belong to Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Service. The minimum educational qualification for being directly recruited as Agricultural Officer is Bachelor of Science (Agriculture) while so far as Deputy Agricultural Officers are concerned the minimum qualification for being considered for promotion to the said post is passing of SSLC examination equivalent to 10th standard examination. The respondents contended before the Tribunal that though they were discharging the same type of duties as Agricultural Officers the pay scale available to them was Rs. 1600-60-2300-60-2660/- while the pay scale of Agricultural Officers which was originally Rs. 1640-60-2600-75-2900/- was further upward revised to Rs. 1820-60-2300-75-3200/- and no such upward revisions and parity of revised pay scale were offered to the Deputy Agricultural Officers like the respondents. As noted earlier the said contention of the respondents appealed to the Tribunal and on applying the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work the impugned order was passed in favour of the respondents.
(3.) IN support of these appeals learned counsel for appellants submitted, relying on a series of decisions of this Court to which we will make as reference hereafter, that difference in educational qualifications can furnish a rational criterion for classifying different categories of employees and for offering them different pay scales. It was submitted that Agricultural Officers are directly recruited as gazetted officers in Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Service while the respondents who were promotee-Deputy Agricultural Officers were non-gazetted officers belonging to Tamil Nadu Agricultural Extension Subordinate Service. That the methods or recruitment to both these services were different. Agricultural Officers were directly recruited while Deputy Agricultural Officers were promotees. Their educational qualifications were also different. Before a direct recruit can be considered for appointment as Agricultural Officer from open market he has to possess the degree of Bachelor of Science (Agriculture) in addition to other requisite qualifications as laid down by the statutory rules while so far as the Deputy Agricultural Officer is concerned all that was required was passing of SSLC examination with the requisite experience as laid down in the Rules. That though they may be discharging the same type of duties, the quality of work which they were required to carry out was entirely different. That out of 2390 posts of Agricultural officers there were 1372 posts to which Deputy Agricultural Officers could not be posted as they were of specialised type while only for the rest of 1018 posts Deputy Agricultural Officers could also be posted to work and in that sense for these 1018 posts there was interchangeability of assignment between these two groups of employees. It was further contended that even though the duty charts of both these groups of employees were almost identical there were certain special duties assigned to Agricultural Officers which could not be entrusted to Deputy Agricultural Officers. It was therefore, submitted that these two classes of employees though working in the Agriculture Department of the State form two distinct and separate classes and there was no comparison between the two to enable them to earn same pay scale and consequently the Tribunal had committed a patent error of law in passing the impugned order in their favour. Learned counsel for the respondents on the other hand submitted that once it is held that the respondents were doing same type of work as their counterpart Agricultural Officers the source of recruitment of officers would become irrelevant and it is the nature of the work which was almost similar that would entitle the respondents to claim equal pay for equal work which they were doing. That even though some of the work could not have been assigned to them as mentioned in paragraph (5) of the Additional Affidavit filed by Shri V. Srinivasan, Deputy Secretary to Government, Agricultural Department, there was material to point out that even the work of drawing samples could be entrusted to the Deputy Agricultural Officers and consequently on the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work the Tribunal was justified in passing the impugned order in their favour especially in the light of Articles 14 and 16 read with Article 39 (d) of the Constitution of India. In support of this contention he placed reliance on some of the decisions of this Court to which we will make a reference hereafter.;