Justice P. Madhavi Devi of Telangana High Court on Tuesday directed the State government to explain its stand within a week over regularising the services of over 9,000 junior panchayat secretaries.
The interim direction was passed in a writ petition filed by Telangana Panchayat Secretaries Federation seeking a direction to State government for regularisation of the services of junior panchayat secretaries appointed four years ago. The Federation contended that the government at the time of appointing them had assured that their services would be regularised after three years.
However, the government extended their appointment period from three years to four years. The fourth year had ended by this July but the services of the panchayat secretaries were not regularised, the Federation said in its petition.
The Federation told the court that the junior panchayat secretaries were appointed after selecting the candidates by conducting a written examination. The notification stated that services of the selected candidates, who show satisfactory performance, would be regularised as panchayat secretaries-grade-IV.
However, this promise was not fulfilled, the petitioner said.