GOVERNMENT OF SIND Versus SHAFIULLAH QURESHI

ZAFFAR HUSSAIN MIRZA, J .--These twelve appeals arise out of a consolidated order of the Sind Service Tribunal, Karachi, dated 19th August, 1985, disposing of six service appeals in respect of seniority of promotee Deputy Superintendents of Police. They are, therefore, being disposed of by this common judgment.

2. It may be stated at the very outset that the Service Tribunal, in allowing the six appeals before it had declared the impugned notification, dated 24th December, 1983, issued by the Sind Provincial Government in the Home Department, as illegal and of no legal effect, and the earlier notification dated 29th September, 1981 issued by the same department, by which seniority was assigned to the six appellants before it was upheld as valid in law. Out of the 12 appeals before us the first six are by the Government of Sind and the rest are by one Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah who sought to intervene in the pending six appeals before the Service Tribunal as he was not impleaded as a party but his application for being joined as a party was dismissed and the Service Tribunal decided the appeals by the impugned order.

3. The Government of Sind as well as Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah were aggrieved by the impugned judgment of the Service Tribunal and their petitions for leave to appeal were taken up together by this Court and leave was granted by a common order. However, it may be pointed out that in support of the first set of six petitions filed by the Provincial Government the only contention raised was that the initial order promoting the six officers whose appeals were accepted by the Service Tribunal, passed by the Inspector-General Police, on 29th June, 1974, as well as regularization of their services by the order dated 4th June, 1975, were both invalid in law, for the reason that during the relevant period the Chief Minister and not the Inspector-General of Police was the competent authority in respect of promotion of the Deputy Superintendents of Police. Similar contention was raised before the Service Tribunal but was rejected. This Court agreed with the view that prevailed with the Service Tribunal that a presumption in law is attached to the notifications issued by the Provincial Government to the effect that the same were issued after observing the necessary formalities under the law. It was pointed out in the order disposing of the petitions by this Court that the legal presumption was not rebutted by the Government .by producing the relevant departmental files either before the Service Tribunal or even before this Court. However, since leave was granted in the connected six petitions filed by Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah, it was thought appropriate that leave may also be granted to the Provincial Government in the first six appeals before us.

4. The learned counsel for the Provincial Government today sought to re-urge the question before us in order to show that at the relevant time the Inspector-General of Police was not the competent authority in regard to the promotion from the post of Deputy Superintendent of Police but such powers vested in the Chief Minister. We may point out that this argument having been rejected at the stage of the leave granting order, we cannot permit the Provincial Government to re-urge the same point at the appeal stage. Even today we find nothing on the record to rebut the presumption of regularity that attaches to the notifications issued by the Government in regard to the promotion of officers. Whether the necessary formalities of submitting the cases of promotion before the competent authorities were observed is a question of fact, on which a finding has been given by the Service Tribunal on the material placed before it. Therefore, we cannot allow the parties to reopen the matter by adducing fresh evidence in this Court on such a question. In the circumstances it is futile to go into the pure question of law unrelated to the factual basis of the same so far as it concerned the parties to these appeals. No other question of law arising from the case has been raised and therefore the first six appeals are liable to be dismissed and we order accordingly.

5. As regards the set of the last six appeals filed by Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah, Mr. Abdul Hafeez Lakho, learned counsel appearing in support thereof pointed out that as he was not impleaded as a party to the appeals before the Service Tribunal and his request to be joined as a party was refused, the sole purpose for filing these appeals was to challenge the correctness and legality of the impugned judgment of the Service Tribunal so far as it adversely affects his service rights. According to him as the decision of the appeals before the Service Tribunal involved the question of seniority of 19 officers and the appellant, who was also an officer of the rank of Deputy Superintendent of Police, therefore, he was a necessary party. However, the main plea of the appellant was that he was a party in another appeal pending before the Service Tribunal (Appeal No.40 of 1985, Shah Muhammad v. Government of Sind), in which the questions in issue were identical and therefore any decision in the six service appeals, out of which the present appeals have arisen would have pre-empted and prejudged the fate of the said appeal. Counsel has informed us that the said appeal is still pending decision before the Service Tribunal and if this Court thinks that the appellant will not be prejudiced, he would not press the six appeals filed by his client.

6. We feel that Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah not being a party to the six appeals disposed of by the Service Tribunal, the same would not be binding on him and cannot in any way prejudice his rights. We are sure that the Service Tribunal will decide Appeal No.40 of 1985, on its own merits and give appellant Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah all the opportunity to canvass his case before it. With this observation six appeals filed by Pir Syed Qurban Ali Shah are also dismissed as not pressed. The result is that all the twelve appeals are dismissed with no order as to costs.

S.Q./G-67/S Appeals dismissed.