S Pal's Service Law Relating to Govt and Public Undertakings

Once appointed, a public servant acquires a status, his   rights and obligations being thereafter determined mainly  by statutory rules. The phenomenal expansion of State activities not only through the Governments but also the giant statutory authorities and Government Companies involving countless citizens bring to the foreground the need for a close study of the laws and rules regulating the inter se relationship between the employer and the employee engaged in public services.
The inbuilt mandatory and imperative restrictions provided in section 240 of the Government of India Act 1935, resulted in India abandoning the English Rule that the servant holds office during the pleasure of the Crown. The administration, the public servants, the lawyers and all others interested in appreciating this branch of the law, however, find the absence of a simplified statement of the underlying principles which regulate the relationship is a serious drawback. The practical as well as the academic importance of the subject are beyond question. Perhaps no other branch of law has contributed so much to the development of Constitutional and Administrative Law in India as Service Law contributed to the interpretation aspect.
In present work the author not only traces the historical background of the Service Law but also brings to the readers the entire gamut of the subject, stating the principles in a codified form for proper comprehension. The basic principles culled out and enunciated in a codified form in the first edition almost remain the same. The decisions of the Supreme Court (embracing the entire gamut of this branch of the law) which have been rendered in the meantime require consideration for the purpose of studying the application of the established principles to new situations. Some applications demonstrate a wider range of the basic principles and some indicate a restrictive approach. There are instances where earlier decisions of the Supreme Court have been overruled. In such cases also the overruling is for wrong application of the principles rather than for establishment of new principles. (See for example - Ajit Singh II [(1999) 7 SCC 209]
The procedural aspect relating to judicial redress available to public servants have been indicated in brief in the course of the discussions of the substantive principles in the text with particular reference to the degrees and intensity of judicial review in relation to different topics. By reason of the Administrative Tribunals Act 1985, jurisdiction in relation to service disputes covering a substantial class of public servants have been assigned to the Tribunals established under that Act. In resolving such disputes the power of Tribunals has been held to be akin to the power of judicial review exercised by the Courts. This is the main reason why the author has not dealt with the decisions of Tribunals. The author conceived of this work to highlight substantive principles rather  making the book unwieldy by including the decisions of Tribunals.