Sudhir Kumar Atrey v. Union of India
Background
The Military Engineering Service recruited "Superintendent" grade employees separately in five regional Commands in 1983, with each Command publishing its own merit-based select list. Some candidates selected in the Western Command's 1983 panel were not actually appointed until 4-5 years later, in 1987-88. When a combined all-India seniority list was later prepared, a dispute arose over whether these late-joiners should get seniority based on their 1983 selection rank, or only from their actual (later) date of joining: a question that affected their promotions and retirement benefits.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that where recruitment is conducted independently and separately by different authorities (as happened across the five Commands), seniority for a combined all-India list should normally be based on the actual date of appointment/joining, not the date of the original selection panel, since there is no rule to the contrary. It disapproved of a Punjab and Haryana High Court judgment that had taken the opposite view, but declined to unsettle the status of two individuals who had already been promoted and in some cases retired based on that judgment, invoking its special power under Article 142 to do "complete justice" without disturbing settled rights after decades. One appeal was dismissed and the connected appeal was allowed on this basis.
Lesson Learnt
When seniority rules are silent, an employee's rank generally counts from when they actually joined service, not from an earlier selection panel they were part of, but courts can still protect individuals who already relied in good faith on a since-disapproved ruling, especially after very long delays.