Quota case: 3,000 demotions effected, state tells SC

The Karnataka government on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that it has so far effected 5,000 promotions and 3,000 demotions in compliance with the apex court’s judgement of February 9, 2017, invalidating the law on the reservation in promotion for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes employees.

It however submitted that some of the employees could not take charge at their new postings due to their deployment in election duties.

A bench of Justices Adarsh Kumar Goel and U U Lalit made it categorical that the judgement in the B K Pavitra case, mandating consequential actions, including promotion and reversion, have to be complied with in its true letter and spirit. “Either Additional Chief Secretary has to file an affidavit stating that the judgement has been fully complied with or he or she has to be personally present before the court on July 4,” the bench said.

Senior advocate Basava Prabhu Patil, along with state Advocate General Madhusudan R Naik, said revision of the seniority list was to be undertaken in about 45 departments. All the demotions and reversions have been done, but in some cases, the employees could not report at their new posts due to duties for elections to be held on May 12. The counsel sought further time for giving full effect to the judgement.

Senior advocates Rajeev Dhavan and Kiran Suri and advocate Kumar Parimal, representing the beneficiary employees, contended that the state government so far made only partial compliance. They pointed to certain discrepancies in the affidavit filed by the state government and sought direction to the top state officials to be personally present before the court. On this, the state counsel agreed to look into the issues raised by them.

The bench also said, “they (the state government) have substantially complied with the judgement. You can’t ignore the level of Herculean works, they were assigned to.”

The court further said, within 10 days, all the election-related duties would be over and there would be no obstruction in implementing the judgement. It put the matter for further hearing after summer vacations on July 4.