By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, July 15: The High Court of Meghalaya said the members of MeECL Progressive Workers’ Union are entitled to the minimum pay scale at the lowest grade in the regular pay scale.
The petitioner, MeECL Progressive Workers’ Union approached the high court with instant application on behalf of its members who are employees working under the Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited (MeECL), seeking a writ of mandamus directing the respondents to pay the members of the union appointed as regular casual or contractual employees to Grade-III and IV posts with minimum pay scale revised from time to time, with permissible allowances such as dearness allowance as are being paid to similarly placed regular employees with arrears of pay.
The court heard. P. Yobin, the counsel for the union submitted that the union members were appointed in the sanctioned posts also available in the regular cadre. However, they were appointed on a casual or contractual basis, having been in service for about two decades or so.
These posts include mali, sweeper, cleaner, pump operator, chowkidar, peon, teacher, and carpenter. The counsel also submitted that the members of the union have been performing duties similar to what the regular employees holding the same or corresponding posts do.
A.S. Pandey, the MeECL’s counsel argued that the petition is not maintainable in its present form as it has been filed on behalf of many petitioners although they are members of the union but with different causes of action where the relief sought by them cannot be clubbed together in a single writ petition.
He cited paragraph 5 of the petition where an averment has been made that the members of the union were appointed in the sanctioned posts also available in the regular cadre, the nature and responsibility of the work of both posts being the same.
A comprehensive table listing the names of the posts held by the members of the union and the posts in the regular cadre has not been shown in the petition, he argued.
The court, citing the Jagjit Singh case, subsequently observed that the members of the union are entitled to the minimum pay scale at the lowest grade in the regular pay scale applicable to their counterparts. The court allowed the petition and directed the MeECL authorities to take necessary action to ensure that the members of the union, named in Annexure-A/3, are paid equal pay for equal work. It gave the MeECL two months to complete the process.