The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has directed the State government to take appropriate steps to make necessary amendments to the relevant rules for preparing the panel to promote Assistants to the posts of Deputy Tahsildar.
The court was hearing a batch of writ petitions pertaining to the issue of temporary promotions made to the posts of the Deputy Tahsildar in Dindigul, Pudukkottai and Ramanathapuram districts.
Justice R. Suresh Kumar observed that the State government should make amendments to the relevant rules for appointment to the posts of Deputy Tahsildar within four weeks by implementing the direction given by the High Court in 2019.
The court had taken cognisance of the fact that there were two sets of Assistants – promotee Assistants and direct recruited Assistants – who constituted the feeder category to the posts of Deputy Tahsildar.
There was always conflict between the two whenever a seniority list was prepared for preparing a panel to promote Assistants to the posts of Deputy Tahsildar and this led to a number of litigations.
To settle the issue, the High Court had in 2019 directed the State that such a seniority list be prepared by giving a reasonable gap between the date of preparation of such list and date of preparation of panel.
Justice Suresh Kumar directed the State government to implement this order and said failure to do so would be a wilful violation of the order of the High Court. In such circumstances, the matter would be referred to a Division Bench to take appropriate action by invoking the provisions of the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.
With respect to the temporary promotions made to the posts of Deputy Tahsildar, the promotees should continue to hold office for now and vacate office once regular promotions were given effect, the court said. The State government had made the temporary promotions so that district administrations would not get affected in view of the fight against COVID-19.
