I.S. Tiwana, J. - (1.) In these four Civil Writ Petitions Nos. 495, 634, 1392 and 2756 of 1985, the seven petitioners are the employees of respondent No. 2, i.e., Punjab Water Supply and Sewerage Board (for short, the Board) and all of them were promoted from the posts of Junior Engineers to those of Sub Divisional Engineers vide various orders of different dates passed by the Managing Director of the Board. They are sought to be reverted now on the ground that their promotions were provisional and they have to make way for the persons who are in Government service (in the P.W.D. Public Health Branch) and are being send to the Board on deputation. Since the common primary contention of these petitioners is that the Government is not entitled to thrust its employees in the service of the Board, they cannot be made to make room for the Sub-Divisional Engineers who are at the moment in Government service. All that is being maintained on behalf of the Board is that the Government vide its communication dated April 8, 1983 (Annexure R. 2/3 to its return) has directed the Board to continue to absorb at least 34 Sub Divisional Engineers on deputation till permanent allocations art made by the Government in terms of Sec. 29 of the Punjab Water Supply arm Sewerage Board Act, 1976 (for short, the Act). In order to appreciate the stand of the Government though it has not chosen to contest the claim of the petitioners in these petitions by filing any return to the same nor is it being represented by any counsel, the following facts deserve to be noticed here.
(2.) With the promulgation of the Act with effect from Jan. 1, 1977, the Board was established for purposes of regulating and developing drinking water supply and sewerage in the State of Punjab. Vide section 29 of the Act to which a reference has been made above, it has been provided as follows: "29. As soon as may be after the notified date, the Government may, after consulting the Board in the manner prescribed, direct by general order that such of to employees serving immediately before the said date in connection with the affairs of the State as are specified in such order shall stand allotted to serve in connection with the affairs of the Board with effect on, and from such date as may be specified in such order: Provided that so far as may be possible- (i) no employee shall be transferred to the service of the Board- (a) unless such employee gives his option in writing agreeing to such transfer; and (b) the Board considers him suitable for such transfer to its service; (ii) the number of employees to be transferred to the service of the Board shall be determined keeping in view the schemes transferred from the Department of Public Health to the Board on the notified date: Provided further that the conditions of service of an employee of the Department of Public Health transferred to the service of the Board shall not be varied by the Board to his disadvantage. Explanation. In this section and in sections 30 and 31 "notified date" in regard to persons transferred to the service of the Board under this section means such date as is notified by the Government in this behalf." It is not in dispute before me that the 'notified date' in the instant case is Jan. 1, 1977 and as a result of the promulgation of the Act two permanent circles of the P.W.D. Public Health Department of the State Government where various schemes to be carried out by the Board under the Act were going on, were transferred to the Board and as a result of this, services of 34 Sub-Divisional Engineers stood transferred to the Board on deputation. It is again not a matter of dispute that out of these 34 Sub Divisional Engineers who had initially come to the service of the Board with the promulgation of the Act, at least seven have vacated these posts for various reasons, i.e., on account of retirement or going back to the parent department or even on promotion. As has already been indicated above, the Government chooses to fill up these posts by sending some other Sub-Divisional Engineers who are in the service of the Government on the plea that in terms of section 29 of the Act, 34 posts if Sub-Divisional Engineers who had initially been transferred to the Board, would remain available to the Government till it finally passes an order in terms of the said section and the Government would be entitled to send its employees to the Board and these employees have to be taken more or less as deputationists. Having heard the learned counsel for the parties I find no merit in the stand taken by the Government in the light of which the respondent Board has chosen to revert the petitioners.
(3.) It is not anybody's case that till today the Government has passed any order of final allocation of any of its employees in terms of section 29 of the Act. This non-action appears to be deliberate as the Government in all probability according to its own notion wants to keep these 34 posts of Sub Divisional Engineers in the service of the Board as a sort of a reserve pool to keep on sending its employees as and when it chooses to do so. This is just contrary to the intention of section 29 of the Act which has already been reproduced above. This section only entitled the Government to allot or transfer such of its employees who were serving it immediately before Jan. 1, 1977, to the service of the Board only once. That too was to be done soon after the notified date, i.e., Jan. 1, 1977, after consulting the Board and obtaining the options of the employees to be transferred. This having not been done by the Government so far, it cannot be allowed to defeat the purpose or go contrary to the intent of this section by keeping on transferring its employees to the service of the Board as and when it likes. If this process is allowed to go on indefinitely, then the Board will not only be enable to finalise the cadre of its employees but it would also be robbed of its autonomous status. This would completely defeat the purpose of the Act. I therefore, under the circumstances, deem it necessary to direct the State Government to finally pass an order as envisaged by section 29 of the Act within a period of six months from today and till then it would not be permissible for it to allocate or transfer any of its Sub Divisional Engineers to the service of the Board. Mr. Agnihotri, learned Senior Advocate appearing for the Board very fairly and frankly concedes that in case the Board has not to accommodate the so-called Government deputationists, then it has no necessity to revert the petitioners or, in other words, the posts manned by the petitioners remain available to them. Since I have come to the conclusion that the Government cannot thrust its employees on the Board on the pretended exercise of power under section 29 of the Act, the claim of the petitioners has obviously to be accepted i.e., they need not vacate the posts for accommodating the Government deputationists till it passes the order as directed above.;