Two-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan on Thursday ordered reinstatement 43 employees of the government of North West Frontier Province (NWFP).
The employees including engineers and graduates were given jobs by the provincial government in 1988 in Rural Development sector after completing all formalities. Their services were terminated in 2003.
The bench comprising Justice Hamid Ali Mirza and Justice Nasirul Mulk reinstated employees when the NWFP Additional Advocate General Muhammad Isa Khan accepted certain mistakes of the provincial government during the process of employment and afterwards.
However, the bench dismissed a petition of Khalid Nasim, another employee, on the basis of his late entry into the department that could not be considered according to the employment Act 1990 of the provincial government on regularisation of contractual employees.
Senior advocates Muhammad Akram Sheikh, Abdul Rehman Siddiqui and Muhammad Aslam Ans appeared before the court as counsels of the petitioners.
The employees were given increments besides other facilities as permissible to civil servants. NWFP Additional Advocate General, however, said all the 44 employees were given employment for a specific project on temporary basis.
Muhammad Akram Sheikh said all the employees served for about 15 years and they were not even served a single notice by the department during the entire service.
The employees had earlier field a petition in the Peshawar High Court which was dismissed and then appealed the decision at the Supreme Court.
The apex court directed the employees to approach Federal Services Tribunal (FST) but a bench of the FST refused to hear the case by taking the plea that the matter was outside their jurisdiction.