Gagan Ch. Kalita v. The State of Assam & Ors.
Background
The appellant had been teaching Economics on an honorarium basis at a government school in Assam for about sixteen years, but was denied regular appointment as a Post Graduate Teacher (PGT) in Economics; the High Court had refused relief because he could not show that a less meritorious candidate had actually been appointed ahead of him. On an earlier hearing, the Supreme Court had directed the State to verify whether a genuine vacancy existed in the subject.
Decision Breakdown
The State's counsel confirmed that a vacancy did exist, because the candidates originally selected for the post had never actually joined duty. The Court reasoned that since those higher-merit candidates never took up the post, the appellant, who had meanwhile kept the subject taught for sixteen years on honorarium, should have been considered for the appointment, notwithstanding the State's objection that his continuation violated 2006 government instructions. In the interest of complete justice, the Court directed that the appellant be appointed forthwith as a regular PGT in Economics with effect from 2 April 2018, and asked the State to separately consider whether any service benefits could be granted for his sixteen years of past service, while clarifying that this order was based on the case's peculiar facts and should not be treated as a general precedent.
Lesson Learnt
Courts can step in to do "complete justice" in individual service-law cases on their specific facts, such as directing regularisation of a long-serving honorarium teacher into a genuinely vacant post, without that necessarily becoming a binding precedent for other employees' claims.