The Haryana government too has filed appeal against the single judge order of the Punjab and Haryana high court setting aside the Haryana government's policy for reservation in promotion of Classes 3 and 4 employees belonging to the Scheduled Castes (SC) category.
During the hearing on Tuesday, the government told the high court that it too had challenged the single judge order. However, due to some technical issues, the petition could not be listed for hearing.
In December, a division bench had issued notice to the government on the petition by a large number of employees seeking quashing of the single judge order. However, the HC has not stayed the single judge order.
On November 14, the single judge bench of justice Rajesh Bindal had ordered to reverse the accelerated promotions retrospectively from 2006, when the state government had first come up with the policy.
The government in its appeal has now stated that the order should not be made effective retrospectively. Also, it has submitted that government has accepted the report submitted by the committee constituted to assess or examine the backwardness and inadequacy of representation of Scheduled Castes in promotion in government services and decided to grant reservation in promotion satisfying itself with qualifying data, one of the grounds taken by the single judge for quashing the reservation that it was done without a study.
The HC bench had held that the state government issued the 2013 policy for reservation in promotions for SCs in Classes 3 and 4, despite a judgment of the Supreme Court in general and of the Punjab and Haryana high court in particular on the 2006 policy, providing 20% reservation in promotion for SCs in government jobs without any quantifiable data showing backwardness.
{{/usCountry}}The HC bench had held that the state government issued the 2013 policy for reservation in promotions for SCs in Classes 3 and 4, despite a judgment of the Supreme Court in general and of the Punjab and Haryana high court in particular on the 2006 policy, providing 20% reservation in promotion for SCs in government jobs without any quantifiable data showing backwardness.
{{/usCountry}}The matter has been posted for further hearing on July 23.