New Delhi: A group of legal researchers employed by the Delhi High Court on contract between 2018 and 2025 have demanded a long -standing increase in their salary.
Researchers have asked the court to increase their monthly remuneration from Rs 65,000 to Rs 80,000, with the researchers coming into effect from October 1, 2022.
Although in August 2023, the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court approved a proposal for amendment of the monthly remuneration of the law researchers for Rs 80,000, the Delhi government is yet to implement the order.
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Last month filed, “Failure to work on the orders of the Hon’ble Chief Justice continued to stop the dated 16.08.2023, despite the constitutional approval under clear administrative approval and Article 229, the current writ petition is required,” said the petition filed last month.
Although Justice c. A division bench of Hari Shankar and Delhi High Court Ajay Digul was expected to hear the case on Friday, Justice Digpall reusted himself from hearing the case as his brother’s son was a legal researcher. Now the matter will be heard on 2 July.
“One of us (Ajay Digul, J.) is not in a position to listen to the case, lish the case before another bench, in which one of us is not a member, subject to the Honorable order, Chief Justice, Chief Justice, on 2 July 2025,” the court ruled.
What about their case?
In Rusht Malhotra vs. NCT of NCT of Delhi and others, a group of legal researchers transferred to the Delhi High Court to increase the salary hike, calling for Article 229 of the Constitution.
Article 229, which covers the employees and expenses of the High Courts, states that their working conditions are determined by the Chief Justice of the court or by the rules made by some other judges or court officials authorized by the Chief Justice or by the Chief Justice.
However, this provision also specifies that rules related to salary, allowances, holidays or pension require the approval of the Governor of the state.
Despite clear administrative approval and constitutional approval under Article 229, preventing the dues, served as a basis for legal researchers to contact the court in this case.
The issue is not new. In 2017, the Acting Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court approved the increase in the remuneration of law researchers from Rs 25,000 to Rs 35,000.
However, next year, the researchers again appealed to the Delhi High Court to demand the approval of the Delhi government to increase their wages of Rs 15,000 and the number of posts for this job. In other words, they were demanding a remuneration of Rs 50,000.
What happened after going to court?
Despite this, from August 2018 to August 2018, several reminders were to be sent to the Delhi government to implement the increase. Additionally, in September 2019, the Delhi government was made a new request for posts and growth.
But it was not till November 2021 that the government approved Rs 65,000. In doing so, it ignored the pre -arrears and requests for the construction of 120 posts.
Nearly 2 years later, on August 16, 2023, the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court approved a proposal for another amendment of the monthly remuneration of law researchers from Rs 65,000 to Rs 80,000 with an impact from October 2023 to October 2023.
Due to non-masters of the order of 16 August 2023, researchers said they were going to court.
In 2024, several RTIs were filed with the legal and finance departments of the government. The Finance Department denied having any information about the proposals, while the Law Department refused to share any relevant documents in September last year.
This cited Section 8 (1) of the RTI Act, which exempts any information from any information related to “personal information” or which has no relation with “any public activity or interest” and also with any information, whose disclosure will cause an improper attack of a person’s privacy.
Stating that nearly 2 years have passed since the 2023 proposal, GNCTD was first sent, after being approved by the HC Chief Justice, the petitioners said the order to increase their wages had not been implemented.
(Edited by Sugita Katyal)