TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
1994 (9) TMI 357
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....icle 16 we are concerned in these cases, has been spelt out by a good number of Constitution Bench decisions of this Court. It is not necessary to take note of all those cases. It would be enough to first apprise ourselves as to what such a Bench had said in the case of State of J&K v. Triloki Nath Khosa1. Chandrachud, J., as he then was, speaking for self, Ray C.J., and Palekar, J., made certain pertinent observations in this regard which were very ably supplemented by Krishna Iyer, J., speaking for self and Bhagwati, J., as he then was. The sum and substance of what was stated in the leading judgment is that the guarantee of equality is precious and the theory of classification may not be allowed to be extended so as to subvert or submerge the same. Of course, while being called upon to decide whether the classification in question is constitutionally permissible, excellence in service has also to be borne in mind; so too the fact that excellence and equality are not friendly bedfellows. A pragmatic approach is, therefore, required to harmonise the requirements of public services with the aspirations of public servants. 3. Krishna Iyer, J., stated that the social meaning of Arti....
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....sion which needs to be noted is Mohd. Shujat Ali v. Union of India [1975] 1 SCR 449 , wherein Bhagwati, J., as he then was, speaking for the unanimous court dealt with this aspect of the matter at pages 476 to 481 of the Report. After noting what was held in Khosa case,, it was pointed out that though educational qualifications can form basis of classification, it could not be laid down as an invariable rule that whenever any classification is made on such basis, the same must be held to be valid, irrespective of the nature and purpose of the classification or the quality and extent of the difference in the educational qualifications. The learned Judge required it to be remembered that "life has relations not capable always of division into inflexible compartments". These moulds "expand and shrink". It was thereafter observed that in a case it may be perfectly legitimate for the administration to say that having regard to the nature of the functions and duties attached to the post, for the purpose of achieving efficiency in public service, only degree-holders shall be eligible for promotion and not diploma or certificate-holders. It was then observed that though....
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....the Report. The same is that if diploma-holders (of course, on the justification of job-requirements and in the interest of maintaining a certain quality of technical expertise in the cadre) can validly be excluded from the eligibility for promotion to the higher cadre, it does not necessarily follow as inevitable corollary that the choice of the recruitment policy is limited to two, namely, either to consider them 'eligible' or "not eligible". The Bench then stated that the State is not precluded from conferring eligibility on diploma-holders conditioning it by other requirements like varying period of length of experience, which in the case of Roop Chand9 was 10 years for the diploma-holders and 8 years for degree-holders. It was concluded by stating that Article 16 would not prevent the State from formulating a policy which prescribes as an essential part of the conditions for the very eligibility that the candidate must have a particular qualification plus a stipulated quantum of service experience. Being of this view, the rule in question laying down different period of service experience for diploma-holders and degree-holders was not found violative of Artic....
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....n on a par with the graduates. The view expressed in Roop Chand case9 was also referred. 11. Murugesan Bench 10 thereafter noted the hallmark of Shujat Ali case5 which was the need to keep in mind the historical background of the service in question. Decisions in Shamkant7, Ravinder Kumar and Abdul Basheer were then traversed and the Bench upheld the validity of ratio of 3:1 between graduates and diploma-holders in promotion; so also, the longer qualifying period for service for diploma-holders. 12. An oven-hot decision was also brought to our notice the same being by a Bench of two Judges in Nageshwar Prasad v. Union of India, CA No. 3985/84 rendered on July 28, 1994. The Bench, after taking note of the decisions in Roop Chand, Dilip Kumar, Murugesan and Sujat Ali did not find fault with the prescription of 50% quota for the diploma-holders. 13. The aforesaid bird's-eye view of important decisions of this Court on the question of prescribing quota in promotion to higher post based on the educational qualification makes it clear that such a qualification can in certain cases be a valid basis of classification; and the classification need not be relatable only to the eligibil....
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....damental right and what has been stated by Ramaswamy, J., (a minority Judge) in CESC Ltd. v. Subhash Chander, [1992] 3 SCR 23 about social justice being a part of fundamental right may not be accepted by all, there is little to doubt that social justice being a requirement of directive principles of our Constitution, the same has to be our desideratum in any case. 16. From what has been stated above, the following legal propositions emerge regarding educational qualification being a basis of classification relating to promotion in public service: (1) Higher educational qualification is a permissible basis of classification, acceptability of which will depend on the facts and circumstances of each case. (2) Higher educational qualification can be the basis not only for barring promotion, but also for restricting the scope of promotion. (3) Restriction placed cannot however go to the extent of seriously jeopardising the chances of promotion. To decide this, the extent of restriction shall have also to be looked into to ascertain whether it is reasonable. Reasons for this are being indicated later. 17. Keeping in mind the aforesaid legal position, we may now advert to the facts o....
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....nt as mentioned in the counter-affidavit filed by the State, a part of which has been quoted at pages 13 to 16 of SLP (C) No. 10645 of 1989. A perusal of the same shows that the degree-holder Assistant Engineers were designated as Assistant Engineer (Agriculture Engineering) and given gazetted status, whereas diploma-holders were denied the same. This apart, the degree-holders were given higher scale of pay. The affidavit further shows that the post of Executive Engineer (Agricultural Engineering) calls for higher skill, administration, planning and evolving of proposals and drafting. In these aspects most of the diploma-holders were found lacking. It has been mentioned in this affidavit that the degree-holders had studied for six years at college level after leaving school stage, whereas diploma-holders have only three years' study at the level of Institute of Technology after school stage. Because of this, higher technical calibre in degree-holders is presumed. Insofar as the common seniority list is concerned, the submission in the counter-affidavit is that the same "did not allow (sic) to give preference in promoting graduates to the level of Assistant Executive Engine....