2 Asiad golds & finally, a win in court — HC says kabbadi player eligible for Haryana govt Group-A job

Kabaddi player says two fellow players who were also part of team that bagged gold at 2014 Asiad got Group-A jobs but she was told she would get Group-B job as per revised policy.

File photo of Punjab & Haryana HC | Representative image | Commons

Gurugram: The Punjab and Haryana High Court has come to the rescue of a member of the Indian women’s kabaddi team that bagged gold at the 2023 Hangzhou Asian Games, ruling that she is eligible for a Group-A job with the Haryana government.

Nine years have passed since the player and her team won a gold medal at the 2014 Asian Games at Incheon, South Korea, which made her eligible for a Group-A job under the policy notified by the Haryana government on 5 September, 2018.

But the 28-year-old resident of Adampur Dadhi village in Haryana’s Charkhi Dadri district still awaits her appointment letter. The reason for the delay, in this case, is the pending verification of her application for a government job by the body that governs kabaddi in India, the Amateur Kabaddi Federation of India (AKFI).

“I was part of the team that won the World Cup in 2012. Before this, the Haryana government had appointed Joginder Sharma, who was part of the Indian team that won the T-20 cricket World Cup, as DSP in the Haryana Police. But I didn’t get any job. Even after the 2014 Asian Games gold medals, two of my teammates got Group-A jobs, but in my case, I was told that I would get a Group-B post,” the player told ThePrint Friday.

Besides being part of the women’s kabaddi team that won gold at the 2014 and 2023 Asian Games, she was also part of the teams that bagged gold at the 2012 Women’s World Cup held in Patna, the Asian Beach Games held in Haiyang that same year, the 2013 Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games held in Incheon, the 2016 South Asian Games held in Guwahati and Shillong, and the 2017 Asian Kabaddi Championship held in Iran.

‘Rules applicable at time of filing application apply’: HC

In a writ of mandamus filed before the Punjab and Haryana High Court on 13 August, 2020, the player’s counsel, Aftab Singh Khara, contended that delay on the part of the AKFI to verify her application prejudiced her right to a government job.

A writ of mandamus is a petition seeking a court order to government officials directing them to fulfill their obligations or correct an abuse of discretion.

This delay, said the petition, was on account of a challenge — to the election for the federation’s top post — pending before the Delhi High Court.

Her counsel cited the case of Kavita Devi vs State Of Haryana (2013) to argue that the high court can direct the federation to verify the application. He also submitted that the state had verified her credentials in 2014, on the basis of which she was awarded a cash prize and the Bhim Award, the highest sports honour conferred by the Haryana government.

On 17 July, 2021, she moved another application before the high court, saying that the Haryana government had accepted her application for the job and this had been forwarded to the chief secretary on 18 September, 2020. The state government confirmed this in a reply to the high court filed on 18 February, 2021.

However, her hopes for a Group-A job were dashed when the state government on 26 February, 2021, revised its policy for jobs to sportspersons who bagged gold or silver medals in team events. Under the new policy, she was now eligible for a Group-B job.

But her counsel argued that since she had received other benefits in line with the earlier policy, she was still eligible for a Group-A job, and that other sportspersons were appointed to government under the policy notified in 2018.

Having heard the arguments from her counsel and other parties involved, Justice Harsimran Singh Sethi of the Punjab and Haryana High Court observed in an order Thursday that the counsel for the petitioners had submitted that the “only question of law raised in the present petitions is as to whether the policy which was applicable on the date of submitting the application forms by the petitioners to claim the benefit of appointment will be applicable or the subsequently amended policy will be applicable”.

The high court added that this question of law had “already been decided by this court by passing an order in CWP-19244-2019 — Arvind and others vs State of Haryana and others, decided on 05.09.2023 and the question of law raised in the present petitions is also the same”.

In its ruling in the said case, the high court had established that “it is a settled principle of law that whatever rules are applicable at the time of filing an application are to be made applicable and not the subsequent amendment to the rules”. 

The court had also stated that any “delays in finalising the claim of the petitioner(s) will not prejudice the petitioner(s) in any manner and the subsequent amendment to the rules will not take away the right of the petitioner(s) to be considered under the unamended rules, especially, when the right has already been created under the unamended 2018 rules to grant the benefit as per the achievement of the petitioner(s)”.

Khara told ThePrint Friday that he was happy that his client would get the job she deserves based on her commendable track record in kabaddi. 

The state, he said, should “constitute a committee of experts from the field of sports for providing jobs and other benefits” to sportspersons. “Now, IAS officers make the decisions and they too keep changing quite frequently, resulting in a lack of uniformity in the formation of policies and also in their implementation,” he added.

(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)