JAWAD HASSAN, J.----Through this petition under Article 199, of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973 (the "Constitution"), the Petitioner has challenged Notifications dated 23.12.2020 and 31.12.2020 (the "Notifications") issued by the Respondent No.2/Secretary School Education Department whereby he has been transferred from present place of posting. He has also challenged letter dated 01.12.2020 (the "Impugned Letter") issued by the Respondent No.3/Ombudsperson Punjab, Lahore.
2. Short but relevant facts of the case are that Mst. Asia Tasleem Anwar/Respondent No.4 filed a harassm ent complaint against the Petitioner before the Respondent No.3 under the provision of The Protection against Harassm ent of Women at the Workplace Act, 2010 (the "Act") wherein the Respondent No.3 vide the impugned letter required the Respondent No 2 to transfer the Petitioner from present place of posting and in pursuance to which the said Respondent transferred the Petitioner by entrusting the additional charge of Chief Executive Officer to one Mst. Fouzia Hina vide Notification dated 31.12.2020 Hence this petition.
3. Learned counsel for the Petitioner inter-alia contended that the Petitioner has not caused harassm ent to the Respondent No.4; that the Respondent No.3 has no power to issue transfer orders of the Petitioner; that the impugned letter and impugned notifications are against the mandate of law and have been passed by unlawful authority. The counsel for the Petitioner has relied on recent reported judgment of this Court passed in W.P.No.38872 of 2020 dated 17.11.2020 titled "Iram Shahzadi v. Government of Punjab and others. He relied on case law reported as "Asif Saleem v. Chairman Bog University of Lahore and others" (PLD 2019 Lahore 407), "Miss Zubaida Khatoon v. Mrs. Tehmina Sajid Sheikh and others" (2011 SCMR 265), "Dr. Ahmad Salman Waris, Assistant Professor, Services Hospital, Lahore v. Dr. Naeem Akhtar and 5 others" (PLD 1997 SC 382), "Zahid Akhtar v. Government of Punjab through Secretary Local Government and Rural Development, Lahore and 2 others" (PLD 1995 SC 530) and "I.A. Sharwani and others v.
Government of Pakistan through Secretary Finance Division Islamabad and others" (1991 SCMR 1041).
4. Learned Law Officer objected qua maintainability of the present petition and submits chat the transfer matter relates to terms and conditions of service of a civil savant therefore, jurisdiction of this Court cannot be invoked in view of bar contained in Article 212 of the Constitution. In addition to aforesaid, he stated that the Petitioner was performing his duties as an acting Chief Executive Officer and order passed by the Respondent No.3, during the pendency of complaint, has been implemented by the Respondent No.2.
5. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and gone through the available record.
6. It evinces from the record that a complaint, under the provisions of the Act, was filed by the Respondent No.4 which was received by the office of the Respondent No.3 on 05.10.2020. Although the Petitioner has not appended with this petition the complete proceeding conducted by the Respondent No.3 yet from the documents attached with this petition, it reveals that during the pendency of complaint, the Respondent No.3 passed the impugned letter by invoking Section 11 of the Act read with Schedule (c)(x) requiring the Respondent No.2 to transfer the Petitioner from present place of posting till the decision of harassment complaint. The Respondent No.2 vide impugned Notification dated 23.12.2020 placed the services of the Petitioner at the disposal of School Education Department and also entrusted the additional charge of the post of Chief Executive Officer to one Mst. Fouzia Hina. Initially, the impugned letter was challenged by the Petitioner through W.P.No.8550 of 2020/BWP which was disposed of being not pressed by him in order to avail appropriate remedy against aforesaid order. However, through this writ petition, he challenged the impugned letter along with the impugned Notifications.
7. The sole ground agitated by the Petitioner is that the Ombudsperson/the Respondent No.3 has no power to recommend/require the transfer of the Petitioner. The pendency of complaint before the Respondent No.3 is not disputed by all hands. In the case in hand, the Respondent No.3, has only required the Competent Authority / Respondent No.2 vide the impugned letter to transfer the Petitioner from the present place of posting keeping in view the harassment against the Respondent No.4 as well as her witnesses as observed in the impugned letter.
8. By examining the preamble of the Act, it is crystal clear that it provides protection against harassm ent of women at workplace and also recognizes fundamental rights of citizen to dignity of person. The Act was enacted by the Parliament solely for the protection of women against harassm ent at workplace by conferring the powers to the Ombudsperson under Section 8 of the Act to enquire into the complaint read with powers under Section 10 of the Act. The main purpose of enacting the Act by the Parliament is to protect the women at workplace because under Article 34 of the Constitution, full participation of women in national life is ensured with protection of family etc. under Article 35 of the Constitution. Article 27 of the Constitution safeguards the discrimination of service of citizen including sex, as Article 14 provides dignity and privacy of person under the Constitution. Reliance in this regard is placed on reported judgment of this Court "Asif Saleem v.
Chairman Bog University of Lahore and others" (PLD 2019 Lahore 407) wherein it has been held that "intention of the legislature for enacting the Act was to protect all employees from being harassed or exploited during employment which could be at the workplace or any environment as specified in their terms and conditions of the employment. Any worker who was employed in any manner or capacity with the employer was protected from being harassed". In the judgment supra, the preamble of the Act was discussed in the manner that "sexual harassment, and harassment on non-gender discriminatory grounds, polluted the working environment and could have a devastating effect on the health, confidence, morale and performance of those affected by it. Commonly, the anxiety and stress produced by sexual harassment and harassment may lead to those subjected to it taking time off work dur to sickness and stress, being less efficient at work or leaving their job to seek work themselves. Employees often suffered the adverse consequence of the harassment itself and, in addition, the short and long term damage to their employment prospects if they were forced to forgo promotion or to change jobs. Sexual harassment and harassment may also have a damaging impact not only on employees themselves but also those who witnesses it or had knowledge of unwanted behavior".##TS## In the present case, the Ombudsperson, while passing the impugned letter has exercised the powers under Section 4 read with Section 11 of the Act. The schedule of the Act read with Section 2(c) and Section 11 provides Code of Conduct for the protection against harassment of women at the workplace. The Ombudsperson in the impugned letter relied on Part-c of the Code 'Retaliation' by the Petitioner. The Code is made under Section 11 of the Act which cast upon responsibility on the employer to ensure the implementation of the Act and incorporate Code against the harassment at workplace as part of their management policy. From the documents attached with this petition, the complaint was filed before the Respondent No.3 on 05.10.2020 while the Respondents submitted parawise comments on 23.12.2020. During the pendency of complaint, the Ombudsperson after examining the witnesses and recording of their statements rightly proceeded to invoke Section 11 of the Code.
9. So far as the case law cited by the learned counsel for the Petitioner in support of his contention is concerned, the same is distinguishable from the case in hand as each and every case has its own facts and circumstances hence cannot be relied upon.
10. As regards the impugned Notifications through which the Petitioner has been transferred, I am not inclined to interfere with them as the Hon'ble Supreme Court of Pakistan in case titled "Ali Azhar Khan Baloch and others v. Province of Sindh and others" (2015 SCMR 456) at page-522 in paragraph 151 held that we, for the aforesaid reasons, conclude that the exercise of jurisdiction by way of suit and Constitution petition filed by a civil Servant with regard to his terms and conditions of service is violative of Articles 175, 212 and 240 and the law.
11. In view of the above, this petition is meritless and is accordingly dismissed in limine.