ORDER Saad Saood Jan (Chairman) --The appellant was appointed as Social Welfare Officer on ad hoc basis by an order dated 24-1-1967. This appointment was to last till the post was filled on the recommendations of the Public Service Commission. Later on, it was found that a reference to the Public Service Commission was unnecessary. However, to consider the suitability for regular appointment of the appellant and some other ad hoc appointees who were recruited under similar conditions the Government constituted a Selection Board. This Board did not consider the appellant fit for regular appointment and placed him on special report for two years. After the expiry of the said period his services were terminated. He preferred an appeal against the termination of his services which was rejected.
2. From the above recital of the facts it will be noticed that the services of the appellant were terminated because he was not found fit to hold the post of a Social Welfare Officer. Now sub-clause (/) of paragraph (6) to the proviso to section 4, Puojab Administrative Tribunals Act, 1974, states that no appeal shall lie to the Tribunal against an order or decision of a departmental authority determining the fitness or otherwise of a person to be appointed to a post. This appeal is hit by this bar and as such is misconceived. A The learned counsel for the appellant contends that the Selection Board bad in fact regularised the appointment of the appellant and in this context he has referred to Annexure 4G\. We have read this Annexure very carefully and are of the view that the contention of the learned counsel is without any substance. The ad hoc appointees whose appointments were regularised by the Selection Board are mentiond in the opening paragraph of the Annexure. The appellant is not included among them. His name occurs in the second paragraph and it is stated against his name that he is to be placed on special report for two years. In clause (d) of the concluding paragraph it is stated that those S. W. Os. in whose case one more C. R. is to be scrutinized would again be considered by the Selection Board for regular appointment. In the circumstances the learned counsel's assertion that the appellant was approved by the Selection Board or that his appointment had been regularized by the said Board is factually incorrect. The learned counsel for the appellant then referred to the notification No. SOR-I(SGA&ID)-16/l-73(Gen), published in the Extraordinary Issue of the Punjab Gazette, published on 10-8-1973. It is stated in this notification that any person appointed on ad hoc basis to any gazetted service or post and who has continuously served in any such service or post, as the case may be, since or before 1st October 1969, and whose appointment to such service or post has not been regularised, shall, with effect from the date of this notification, be deemed to have been regularly appointed to such service or post. The leamed counsel states that even if it is taken that the Selection Board had not regularised his appointment it stood regularised by virtue of this notification. It is to be observed that after the termination of his services by the Government he filed a civil suit and obtained a stay order. Thus after the termination of Its services he continued to remain in service on the footing of the said stay order.
We have considered the notification in question in its entirety and we do not think that it helps the learned counsel. The expression "has not been regularised" as occurring in the notification obviously refers to such cases where the procedure for regularising the appointment has not yet been gone into. This is not the case with the appellant. The competent authority did consider his case and decided to terminate his services. Thus there has been an unequivocal and a definite decision in this case. The fact that he obtained a stay order from a civil Court and od the basis of that continued to remain in service will not bring his case within the purview of the said notification.
Finally the learned counsel for the appellant contended that the post of Social Welfare Officer fell in the National Pay Scale No. I6 and as such the Selection Board was not conpetent to take any decision in his case. This argument is again without any substance for the order terminating his services was passed much before the decision to include the posts of the Social Welfare Officers in the said National Pay Scale was made. For the reasons stated above we do not find any force in this appeal which is hereby dismissed in limine.