GULZAR ALI SHAH Versus SECRETARY

GHULAM MUJADID ISRAN (MEMBER).‑‑‑ Appellant Syed Gulzar Ali Shah, Deputy Director, Directorate of Manpower and Training has filed this appeal under section 4 of the Sindh Service Tribunals Act, 1973, in which has prayed that the adverse entries in his ACRs for the period from 1‑1‑1988 to 16‑7‑1988 be expunged.

2. Brief facts of the case are that vide letter No. Lab.(1)1‑13/72‑I, dated 10th May, 1992, Section Officer of Labour and Transport Department communicated the following adverse remarks to the appellant:‑‑

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"Tries to achieve his objective by hook or by crook."

On 25‑5‑1992 the appellant made representation to the Secretary of the Department requesting that the adverse entries may be expugned. However, his representation was not decided within the statutory period of 90 days. Hence this appeal.

3.We heard Mr. Abdul Sattar Mughal counsel for the appellant and Mr. Habibur Rasheed for official respondents. With their assistance we also perused the relevant record.

4. We have given our anxious thought to the submissions advanced by the learned counsel for the parties and found that in the present case relevant instructions regarding writing of ACRS, in time, have been violated as the adverse remarks given in the ACR for the period of 1‑1‑1988 to 16‑7‑1988 was admittedly written by reporting officer namely S.M.H. RLVI, former Director Manpower and Training after his retirement of 13‑8‑1990 and were communicated to the appellant as late as on 10‑5‑1992. The very fact that the report in question was initiated after lapse of two years goes against para. 2 of the instructions for writing of confidential report which is reproduced as under:‑‑

"2. When should a report be written‑ ‑The report shall relate to a calendar year. It shall be initiated in the first week of January by the initiating authority and forwarded to the higher authority in the same week. The higher authority shall give its remarks within one week. In case it is necessary to send the report to a third authority, it will be sent to that authority immediately. The final authority shall also record its views within a week. Time schedule has been laid down so that the remarks are based on the performance of the Government servants during the calendar year to which they relate. Otherwise, consciously or sub‑consciously subsequent' events can contribute towards the formation of opinion in respect of the past year. Thus the reports should be completed within the month of January each year."

5. On perusal of the said report its appears that the adverse entry is not in consonance with the entry made in column 3 of Part III of the report namely `integrity'. In this column the appellant has been placed in column `B' which is not adverse. The record produced before us reveals that even the Countersigning Officer has also not agreed with the reporting officer by not underlining the entries in red ink. On the contrary he has appreciated the services of the appellant with the following remarks made in Part VII of the said report:‑‑

"Acceptable in higher grade."

6. We also went through the service record of the appellant. It is satisfactory and unblemished. There is nothing on record to indicate that any counselling or warning was ever conveyed to the appellant by the reporting officer during the period under adverse entry. We were rather surprised to note that in sub‑part "assessment of performance" of Part V of the said report the very reporting officer appeared to be satisfied with the performance of the appellant. The entry is an under:‑‑

"Performance during the period has been satisfactory. He took lot of j interest in locating sites for etc."

7. We therefore see no reason to uphold the said adverse remarks of the Reporting Officer, which are unjustified and liable to be expunged.

In the light of the above discussion, we accept the appeal with no order as to costs and direct that the adverse remarks recorded in the appellant's ACR for the period from 1‑1‑1988 to 16‑7‑1988 be expunged.

H.B.T./403/Sr.S ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Appeal accepted.