' UMAR ATA BANDIAL, J.--- The petitioner is an employee of the respondent No,2, Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research ("Council"). He is not a civil servant. In 1998 he was ignored by the promotion board when his batch mates were considered and promoted to BS-19. The petitioner commenced litigation against the Council in 1998 to secure his promotion. Ultimately he succeeded and in compliance with judgment of this Court dated 18-7-2007 given in Writ Petition No,8672 of 2006, the Council by order dated 29-8-2007 promoted the petitioner to BS-19 with retrospective effect from 12-2-1998. Thereafter, on 18-1-2008 the petitioner was promoted to BS-20 also retrospectively with effect from 21-3-2007.
2. The question before the Court is whether the petitioner is entitled to promotion to BS-20 from a date earlier than the antedate fixed by the Council if he is fully given the benefit of regulation 15- B(i)(b) of the Employees Service Regulations 1931 of the Council. The provisions of the said regulation are reproduced below:--- "(i) Persons who are approved by the Selection Board/DPC for promotion to the higher grade on an earlier date shall rank senior to those who are approved on a later date, provided that:-
(a) A person eligible for promotion who is inadvertently omitted from consideration in the original reference and is superseded, when he is subsequently considered and approved for promotion he will take his seniority with the original batch;
(b) When in a single reference, the Selection Board/DPC are asked to recommend more than one person and the recommendation of the Selection Board/DPC is held up in respect of one or more such persons for want of complete papers etc., or for reasons beyond the control of the person concerned, the recommendation of the Selection Board/DPC in respect of such person when made subsequently will be deemed to have been made on the date when the recommendation in respect of the original batch was made;"
2. It is contended by the learned counsel for the petitioner that officers junior to the petitioner were promoted to BS-20 on 12-5-2004. Under the provisions of the aforesaid regulation 15-B, the petitioner claims antedated promotion with effect from 12-5-2004 because delay in the petitioner's promotion after that date was for reasons beyond his control in terms of Regulation 15-B (supra).
He submits that the reason for the 'petitioner's supersession was the unlawful refusal by the Council to promote the petitioner to BS 19 against which he had to resort litigation. The direction in the judgment of this Court dated 18-7-2007 followed by the Council's decision to antedate the petitioner's promotion to BS-19 from 12-2-1998 explains the cause of delay in the petitioner's promotion to BS-20 as being factors beyond his control. In the circumstances, learned counsel refers to regulation 15-B (supra) to claim that his promotion be ante-dated to 12-5-2004, the date when his junior colleagues were promoted. He relies on Mian Safdar Mahmood and 18 others v.
Punjab Service Tribunal and 2 others 1992 SCMR 1394 and Managing Director (Power), WAPDA and others v. Muhammad Luqman PLD 2003 SC 175 which reiterate the general principle that a government employee if eligible is entitled to pro forma promotion with effect from the date when his juniors were promoted. It is this principle that is enshrined in the aforesaid regulation 15-B of the Council.
3. Learned counsel for the respondent has opposed the prayer on the ground that the petitioner claims his right under non-statutory regulations which are neither enforceable against nor binding on the council. He relies on Mrs. Anisa Rehman v. PIAC 1994 SCMR 2232. Secondly,' he objects that the petitioner's claimed promotion from an earlier date involves subjective assessment which the Court cannot make. In this behalf he refers to Muhammad Anis and others v. Abdul Hasib and others PLD. 1994 SC 539 and Mian Abdul Malik v. Dr. Sabir Zameer Siddiqui 1991 SCMR 1129. Presently, he contends that the petitioner was not eligible to be considered for promotion to BS-20 on 12-5- 2004' because he lacked the qualifying research for promotion on that date. Accordingly, the ante date fixed by the Council for petitioner's promotion to BS-20, that is 21-3-2007, satisfies regulation 15-B (supra).
4. Heard. The respondent has a duty to act justly, fairly and according to the standards that it sets for itself. Therefore its Service Regulations of 1981 cannot be disregarded at whim and are enforceable. Reliance is placed upon Muhammad Shoaib Roomi v. Secretary, Education Department Government of Punjab 2005 SCMR 605; Rizwan Akhtar v. Union of Punjab 2003 PLC (C.S.) 1508. Be that as it may, Regulation 15-B (supra) reiterates the settled rule of law recognized in Luqman's case PLD 2003 SC 175. Accordingly, the rule contained in. Regulation 15-B represents a legal duty of the Council under the general law of the land. The present petition filed to enforce that duty under law is therefore maintainable. The eligibility and qualification of the petitioner for promotion to BS 20 on both objective and subjective criteria admittedly stand satisfied as evidenced by the Council's decision of 18-1-2008 to promote the petitioner to BS 20 with effect from 21-3-2007. The question before the Court is therefore not whether the petitioner satisfies the objective or subjective criteria for promotion but whether he is entitled that his promotion be ante dated to a still earlier date, namely 12-5-2004.
5. The objection by the learned counsel for the Council that in the year 2004 the petitioner's case was not ripe for consideration for promotion to BS-20 for lack of qualifying research is also entirely presumptuous. This is because until 29-8-2007 the petitioner remained in litigation with the Council to secure his promotion to BS-19. Therefore the only relevant date when he could be considered for promotion to BS-20 is after 29-8-2007. At that point of time, the query whether by or before the year 2004 the petitioner possessed qualifying research for promotion to BS-20 is as academic a question as it would be to assess the research work that the petitioner would have done until 2004 if he had actually been promoted to BS-19 in 1998. In the year 2004 the petitioner was detained in BS-18 and was therefore in any event ineligible for promotion to BS-20. In a realistic context the relevant question to be asked is whether on the date when the petitioner was promoted to BS-19, that is 29-8-2007, had he achieved qualifying research work for promotion to BS-20. The answer to that question is obviously yes because the petitioner was promoted to BS-20 on 18-1-2008 retrospectively with effect from 21-3-2007.
6. Accordingly, once the petitioner had met the substantive requirements for promotion to BS-20 on 18-1-2008, the only point that ought to be considered is whether his promotion to BS-20 had been withheld in 2004 for reasons beyond his control. The answer to that question is in the affirmative because his promotion to BS-19 is ante dated to 1998 by the Council. Therefore the petitioner would have been eligible to be considered for promotion to BS-20 in 2004. Based on that legally valid fiction by virtue of the ante date and the fact that the petitioner satisfies the substantive requirements of promotion to BS-20, he is entitled to the benefit of the regulation 15-B (supra) with effect from 12-5-2004 when the first batch of his juniors were promoted.
7. This petition is allowed in the foregoing terms with no orders as to costs.