Shivangi Prakash-

Published on: August 22, 2021, at 11:10 IST

The Supreme Court held the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting for Contempt of Court and fined it Rs 1 lakh for failing to implement a two-year-old judgement in a matter involving departmental promotion.

The apex Court had ordered the Ministry to give departmental candidates all the benefits of service and to consider their applications for promotions in compliance with the Indian Broadcasting (Program) Service Rules 1990 in a ruling dated September 26, 2018, but the order was not followed.

In these circumstances, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting is in contempt of the judgment of this Court. We accordingly impose a fine of Rs 1,00,000 on the respondents. The fine shall be paid over to the National Legal Services Authority within four weeks and shall be recovered from the officers responsible for compliance,” a Bench led by Justice DY Chandrachud said in its August 16 order.

The Bench, which included Justice MR Shah, stated, “There is a clear non-compliance with the directions of this Court.”

“The actual benefits, including arrears of salary shall be paid over to the petitioner with effect from the date on which the upgradation or, as the case may be, promotion, has been granted to him within a period of one month from the date of the order. The petitioner would be entitled to interest at the rate of 6% per annum on the arrears of the salary,” it said.

Rejecting the Ministry’s explanation, the Bench said that they were unimpressed by this explanation in the compliance affidavit.

Because of the authorities’ error, the petitioner was unable to take advantage of his promotion sooner. The Tribunal’s decision was handed down on November 8, 2000. There was no stay of the Tribunal’s or the High Court’s decision to uphold it.

The Top Court said, “The grant of notional promotions to a person in service does not effectuate compliance. Arrears of pay have to be paid over. Had there been compliance with the judgments of the Tribunal and High Court, the petitioner would have received promotion earlier. The petitioner has been deprived of this due to the delay of the respondents.”

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