Patna: The Patna High Court on Tuesday imposed a cost of Rs10 lakh on state for appointing the chairman of state monitoring committee without any legal basis which caused filing of “fortuitous litigations” in the high court.
A division bench of Justices P B Bajanthari and Arun Kumar Jha, while dismissing an intra-court appeal of one Bijay Kumar Singh, also directed the state respondents to deposit the cost in the Prime Minister Relief Fund within two weeks. The appellant’s claim for payment of remunerations in lieu of his services rendered as chairman of the state monitoring committee, Manisana Wage Board, for a period between march 2007 to April 2017 was also rejected by the court.
The appellant was appointed the chairman of said monitoring committee constituted to implement the recommendations of Manisana Wage board for determining fair wages and perks of working journalists in Bihar. Claiming for his remunerations in lieu of chairing the said committee for 10 years, Bijay had initially filed a writ petition, which was dismissed by a single bench in 2018. Thereafter, he preferred an intracourt appeal to be heard by a division bench.
The state government, while contesting the appeal, submitted that appellant’s appointment was purely on ‘honorarium’ basis as he was simultaneously rendering his services as the chairman of state's employment committee. Going into the crux of the matter, the division bench asked the state to show the relevant law/rules on the basis of which the appellant was appointed as head of the said monitoring committee. No such legal basis was furnished by the officers of the state’s labour department who were even summoned by the court.
Expressing astonishment , the high court also said that even after 75 years of independence, the state is making appointments in public offices without following procedure established by law
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