Scope Of Article 226 Very Wide & Can Be Used To Remedy Injustice Wherever It Is Found: Gujarat High Court Directs Payment Of Arrears To Anganwadi Workers

The Gujarat High Court held that the scope of Article 226 of Constitution is very wide and can be used to remedy injustice wherever it is found, and the right of judicial review conferred to the Constitutional Court is to protect the fundamental and other rights of the citizens.

The Court held thus in a batch of Letters Patent Appeals (LPAs) preferred against the Judgment of the Single Judge by which it was declared that Anganwadi Workers (AWWs) and Anganwadi Helpers (AWHs) shall be treated at par with the regularly selected permanent employees holding civil posts in the State or Central Government, and further directions were issued to the Central Government and the State Government to formulate a policy for absorption of the posts of AWWs and AWHs in the Government service and confer consequential benefit of regularization to them.

A Division Bench comprising Justice A.S. Supehia and Justice R.T. Vachhani observed, “The jurisdiction under Article 226 is a check on the discharge on public functions and statutory duties entrust to them, and the High Court is the guardians of the rights and liberties of the citizen and any failure in the responsibility will amount to abdication of solemn duty towards the citizens. It is held that the scope of Article 226 is very wide and can be used to remedy injustice wherever it is found, and the right of judicial review conferred to the Constitutional Court is to protect fundamental and other rights of the citizens.”

The Bench said that the power of the High Courts under Article 226 of the Constitution though are discretionary and has no fetters, but it must be exercised subject to certain self-imposed limitations.

Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Vikramjit Banerjee appeared for the Appellant while Advocate General (AG) Kamal Trivedi and Senior Advocate Shalin Mehta appeared for the Respondents.

Facts of the Case

The Respondent-AWWs and AWHs prayed for regularization of their service and to declare the honorarioum paid to them as violative of Articles 14, 16, 21, and 23 of the Constitution of India, 1950. A direction was also sought to pay the minimum wages, which was paid to other part-time employers engaged in other departments of the State of Gujarat. The Single Judge considered the facets of Integrated Child Development Services Scheme (ICDS Scheme), the functions and onerous duties of both, the AWWs and the AWHs threadbare, and allowed the Writ Petitions.

Reasoning

The High Court after hearing the arguments from both sides, noted, “In the instant case, the AWWs and AWHs, though are performing duties since long, cannot be made permanent looking to the nature of Scheme, which is mutually introduced and implemented by Central and State governments, and is run by allocation of yearly budget.”

The Court reiterated that while exercising the extraordinary and discretion jurisdiction under Article 226, the High Court has to examine that whether the injustice has resulted on account of any decision of a Constitutional authority, a statutory authority, a tribunal or an authority within meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution, and the judicial review is intended to prevent cases of abuse of power or neglect of a duty by the public authority.

“Thus, the settled legal precedent does restrain this Court to pass necessary directions for addressing the issue of paltry wages to the AWWs and AWHs, more predominantly in wake of the observations made by the Apex court in the case of Maniben (supra)”, it added.

The Court said that the duties and obligations of AWWs and AWHs influence the lowest strata of social fabric, and their duties cannot be compared to the duties rendered by other part timers engaged for six hours by the State Departments, for whom the policy of minimum wages of paying Rs.14,800/- is implemented.

“The amount of Rs.14,800/-, in the said Circular, is fixed from 01.01.2019, considering the minimum wages payable to Class-IV employees”, it further noted.

Directions

The Court, therefore, issued the following directions –

A) The Appellants - Central Government and the State Government Departments, jointly or the State Government exclusively, shall pay the minimum monthly wages of Rs. 14,800/- over and above of Rs.10,000/- to the AWWs.

B) Since, the AWWs and AWHs are being paid from the allocated budgetary funds of particular financial year for implementation and running Integrated Child Development Service Scheme, and the funds are tailored looking to the strength of the AWWs and AWHs, the directions to grant aforesaid wages retrospectively from preceding three years of filing of the Writ Petitions, as directed by the Single Judge will increase the financial burden substantially and retrospectively.

C)The arrears and the actual minimum wages shall be paid within a period of 06 (six) months.

D)The present directions will apply to all the AWWs and AWHs engaged in all the Anganwadi Centers of the State of Gujarat.

Accordingly, the High Court allowed the LPAs and issued the necessary directions.

Cause Title- State of Gujarat & Ors. v. Adarsh Gujarat Anganwadi Union & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2025:GUJHC:48406-DB)

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