ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court said the wage structure ought to be crafted in a way that must provide not merely for the bare subsistence of life but also to ensure sincere productivity and proficiency of the employee taking into account the variation in the cost of living.
A three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, held that on the appeals of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Education Department against the decisions of the KP Service Tribunal.
The teachers of the Elementary and Secondary Education Department, KP were getting conveyance allowance but that was later discontinued during summer and winter vacations.
They filed service appeals before the KP Service Tribunal, which were allowed by the impugned judgments. The department aggrieved by them approached the apex court.
The additional advocate general Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa argued that the impugned judgments of the KP Service Tribunal suffer from illegality and are factually incorrect; the impugned judgments are in violation of a notification issued for the discontinuation of conveyance allowance during summer and winter vacations. The SC’s judgment said that non-payment and/or deduction of conveyance allowance from monthly perks during summer and winter vacations would be tantamount to the violation of KP teachers’ fundamental rights.
The judgment, authored by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, stated that the discriminatory treatment with the teachers is totally ill-founded, prejudicial, and inequitable. Instead of providing more congenial working conditions and environment to encourage the noble profession of teaching and to effectively implement and comply with the obligations enshrined under Article 25-A of the Constitution, the teachers’ conveyance allowance, being one of the components of the terms and conditions of their service, was discontinued without any rhyme or reason or any written orders/notification.
The judgment said to enjoy the protection of law and to be treated in accordance with the law is the inalienable right of every citizen. The purposefulness of Article 4 of the Constitution is to ascribe and integrate the doctrine of equality before law or equal protection of law, and no action detrimental to the life and liberty of any person can be taken without due process of law. “Public functionaries are supposed to execute and perform their duty in good faith, honestly and within the precincts of their legally recognised powers so that the person concerned may be treated in accordance with law.”
The objective of good governance cannot be achieved by exercising discretionary powers unreasonably or arbitrarily without rhyme or reason, and/or without compos mentis, but such objective can only be met by adhering to the rules of justness, fairness and openness as enshrined under Articles 4 and 25 of the Constitution.
The judgment said Article 3 of the Constitution casts an unavoidable and inescapable obligation upon the State to ensure the elimination of all forms of exploitation, and the gradual fulfillment of fundamental principles from each according to their ability, to each according to their work. Whereas under Article 38, it is provided that the State shall secure the well-being of the people, irrespective of sex, caste, creed, or race by raising their standard of living, by preventing concentration of wealth and the means of production and distribution in the hands of a few to the detriment of general interest and by ensuring equitable adjustment of rights between employers and employees, and landlords and tenants.
In the case of Ikram Bari and 524 others Vs National Bank of Pakistan through President and another (2005 SCMR 100), this Court held that an Islamic Welfare State is under an obligation to establish a society, which is free from exploitation and wherein social and economic justice is guaranteed to its citizens. Whereas in the case of Pir Imran Sajid and others Vs Managing Director/general Manager (Manager Finance) Telephone Industries of Pakistan and others (2015 SCMR 1257), this Court also held that the whole edifice of governance of the society has its genesis in the Constitution and laws aimed to establish an order, inter alia, ensuring the provisions of socio-economic justice, so that the people may have a guarantee and sense of being treated in accordance with the law and that they are not being deprived of their due rights.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022