Secretary, State of Karnataka and Others v. Umadevi (3) and Others
"Public employment must follow the constitutional scheme of open competition under the rules; persons engaged temporarily or on daily wages outside that scheme have no right to regularisation and courts should not direct it, save for the one-time regularisation of irregular appointees to sanctioned posts who had served ten years or more without court orders."
Issues Before the Court
- (i)
Whether temporary, contractual, casual or daily-wage employees engaged outside the constitutional scheme of public employment have a right to be regularised or made permanent, and whether courts can direct their absorption?
- (ii)
Whether the doctrine of legitimate expectation, or Articles 14, 16 and 21, entitles such employees to regularisation?
Law & Rules Applicable
- (i)
Constitution of India, Articles 14 and 16 (equality of opportunity in public employment), Article 309 (recruitment rules) and Article 320 (functions of Public Service Commissions).
- (ii)
Constitution of India, Articles 21 and 226.
Application to Facts & Circumstances
The appeals arose from High Court directions to regularise daily-wage workers in the Commercial Taxes Department of Karnataka and other temporary employees. Because decisions of three-judge Benches conflicted on whether such employees could claim regularisation, the matters were referred to a Constitution Bench.
Writing for the Constitution Bench, Balasubramanyan J. held that public employment must follow the constitutional scheme: open competition among eligible candidates under the applicable rules, in conformity with Articles 14 and 16. A temporary, contractual, casual or daily-wage engagement made outside that scheme gives no right to be made permanent, however long it has continued, and courts should not direct absorption or regularisation, which would amount to creating another mode of public appointment.
Regularisation can cure a procedural irregularity, but not an illegality in the appointment, and it does not mean permanence. The doctrine of legitimate expectation did not help employees who knew the nature of their engagement, and Article 21 could not be invoked to defeat the claims of the many others entitled to compete for public posts.
As a one-time measure, the Union and the States were directed to regularise, within six months, persons irregularly (not illegally) appointed: duly qualified persons who had worked for ten years or more in duly sanctioned vacant posts, without the protection of orders of courts or tribunals. Earlier decisions running counter to these principles were to lose their status as precedents.
Conclusion & Ruling
- (i)
The High Court's directions for regularisation were set aside. The daily-wage workers of the Commercial Taxes Department were held entitled to the wages directed by the High Court only from the date of its Division Bench judgment, not retrospectively, and were allowed to compete in regular recruitment with relaxation of age and weightage for their service.
- (ii)
Employees engaged outside the constitutional scheme have no right to regularisation, and courts should not direct it; the one-time scheme was confined to irregular appointees to sanctioned posts who had served ten years or more without court orders.
- (iii)
The decision remains the governing authority on regularisation in public employment.