Civil Writ Petition No. 12969 of 1991. Case: Krishan Lal Sehgal, Actor and Ors. Vs State of Haryana and Anr.. High Court of Punjab (India)

Case NumberCivil Writ Petition No. 12969 of 1991
CounselFor Appellant: K.G. Chaudhry, Adv. and For Respondents: Mani Ram, Adv.
JudgesV.K. Bali and A.L. Bahri, JJ.
IssueConstitution of India - Articles 14, 16, 39
CitationILR 1993 (1) P&H 237
Judgement DateDecember 03, 1991
CourtHigh Court of Punjab (India)

Judgment:

V.K. Bali, J.

  1. In this second bout of litigation, the Petitioners who are Actors, Stage Masters, Harmonium Masters and Tabla Masters and are employees of the Department of Public Relations, Haryana elamour for the same pay as is being given to the persons on the same posts and in the same very department in Rural Community Theatre and who are performing the same and similar kind of duties. The grievance is of discrimination against the State of Haryana for not following the doctrine of 'equal work equal pay'. Necessary facts need to be noticed first.

  2. Petitioners are working in the office of District Public Relations Officer in the State of Haryana as Actors, Stage Masters, Harmonium Masters and Tabla Masters in the pay scale of Rs. 950-1,400. The members of Rural Community Theatre in the same very department who were working on the same posts as the Petitioners are, under the same employer have their pay scales fixed at Rs. 1,400-2,600. For removing the disparity in the pay scales, the Petitioners through their Associations made number of representations to the Respondents but when the same were cold shouldered they had no choice but to take up the matter in this Court by way of Civil Writ Petition No. 891 of 1991. The matter came up for hearing before a Division Bench and,-vide order, dated January 18, 1991, a direction was issued to the Respondents to decide the representations of the Petitioners within three months. The representation having been decided against the Petitioners,-vide order, dated May 13, 1991, the Petitioners per necessity have approached this Court for the second time. The posts of the Petitioners are of technical nature and they require more skill, manual labour and time to perform their duties as compared to their counter-parts in the Rural Community Theatre. The Petitioners are the members of drama party. They stage their shows to entertain the public at the District Level, State Level, National Level and International Level whereas the members of Rural Community Theatre stage their shows to entertain the public only in rural areas within the District. It is the case of the Petitioners that they had staged their shows to entertain the people on behalf of the State of Haryana in Asiad 82 at Delhi as well as in "Apna Ustav" 1986. Besides, they also staged their shows in various States from time to time like Bombay, Ladakh, Mizoram, Goa and Nagaland. Although the members of Rural Community Theatre have...

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