- (1.) By this single judgment, I shall dispose of CWP No.21633 of 2011 and CWP No.18599 of 2014, involving similar questions of law and facts. However, for facility of reference, facts are being extracted from CWP No.21633 of 2011.
(2.) The petitioners are the retired Lecturers from the Government Schools in the State of Punjab. The short controversy in the present case is that the there was a policy of the Government to grant 2/3 increments if a master/mistress acquires Post Graduate qualification during service. Petitioners accordingly acquired Post Graduate qualification during service and were granted three advance increments in the unrevised pay scale. Later on the scales were revised w.e.f. 1.1.1978. Some of the juniors to the petitioners also acquired the post graduate qualification after 1.1.1978 and they were accordingly granted 2/3 the advance increments in the revised scale. The advance increments granted to the petitioner in the unrevised pay scale were merged in the revised scale. The net result was that the juniors to the petitioners were started getting higher pay than the petitioners. It also comes out that the department withdrew the said advance increments to the juniors of the petitioners. However, they approached this Court and said order was set aside. Consequently, the juniors of the petitioners continued to get higher pay than the petitioners, may be on account of wrong grant of the advance increments.
(3.) The plea of the learned counsel for the petitioners is that their pay should be stepped up and made equal to their juniors on the basis of judgment dated 1.3.1995 (Annexure P-1), passed by this Hon'ble Court in Civil Writ Petition No.17005 of 1989 in pursuance to which, the Government had issued the Policy dated 28.10.1998 (Annexure P-4), laying down certain conditions for grant of advance increments. It also comes out that the petitioners had earlier approached this Court by filing Civil Writ Petitions No.19913 of 2009 and 20015 of 2009. The same were disposed of by this Court vide judgment dated 18.04.2011, giving directions to the respondents to consider the claim of the petitioners in the light of the directions given in the judgment and pass a speaking order accordingly. The speaking order dated 18.8.2011 (Annexure P-11) has been passed. The relevant extract from the said order is reproduced as under:- "And whereas, the petitioners in the present case have claimed for stepping up their pay equal to the pay drawn by their junior as referred in the petition. A perusal of relevant record reveals that the juniors referred to by the petitioners were granted the benefit of enhancement of their pay to such levels on account of inadvertence, though the said junior were not entitled. The said benefit was given sought to be withdrawn from such juniors, however the same was not allowed by this Hon'ble Court by its order dated 22.10.2009 in CWP No.999 of 2006 disposed of in terms of order dated 28.5.2009 in CWP No.10472 of 2008.";