High Court: Temporary employees entitled to confirmation upon post permanence

Saurabh Malik

Chandigarh, December 9

The Punjab and Haryana High Court has ruled that an employee appointed temporarily will be entitled to confirmation on the position when it is subsequently upgraded to a permanent one through budgetary provisions.

“A person who is appointed temporarily is to be understood to mean that he is appointed against a post which may not be having a permanent nature, i.e., a lien would not be created against the said post. As and when the post becomes permanent under the budget, the person concerned holding the said post would be entitled to be confirmed on the said post and a lien is created against the said post,” Justice Sanjeev Prakash Sharma ruled.

The ruling came on a petition filed against the state of Punjab and another respondent by Paramjeet Singh through counsel Manu K Bhandari. He submitted that the petitioner had been wrongfully denied regularisation on the data entry operator’s post he was working on in regular pay scale since 1997.

Bhandari submitted that schemes for regularisation were recommended vide letters dated November 10, 2014 and May 4, 2015. However, the respondents did not regularise the petitioner despite a recommendation for the same by the Personnel Department.

Justice Sharma said the state government, vide letter dated January 23, 2001, informed all heads of departments of its decision to review regularisation policy of work-charged/daily wage and other categories of workers. The basic idea was that workers belonging to a particular department were required to be considered only against available regular vacancies there.

Justice Sharma also observed that the question about the petitioner being appointed against an available vacancy was not required to be gone into especially in view of the recommendations made by the Director-cum-Joint Secretary of the department concerned, who stated that the petitioner was appointed against data entry operator’s post created by the Finance Department on October 4, 1996.

Justice Sharma termed as “wholly erroneous” the respondents’ interpretation of treating the petitioner akin to a daily wager or a contractual employee as he was appointed against a pay scale and was selected on a post to be filled in accordance with the conditions of appointment through Subordinate Services Selection Board.

The method of appointment adopted by the respondents was with the state government’s approval. As such, it could not be said that the petitioner was appointed either by backdoor or by irregular method.

“The respondents cannot, therefore, deny him the service benefits merely because the post has been made permanent from 2014. The petitioner would be treated as a confirmed employee from 2014 and would accordingly be entitled for entire benefits of service including the other service benefits as available to the regular employees of the department,” Justice Sharma concluded.

‘Treat petitioner as confirmed employee’

The respondents cannot, therefore, deny him the service benefits merely because the post has been made permanent from 2014. The petitioner would be treated as a confirmed employee from 2014 and would accordingly be entitled for entire benefits of service, including the other service benefits as available to the regular employees of the department. — Justice Sanjeev Prakash Sharma