A belated representation cannot revive a retired employee’s stale promotion claim.

The first respondent was appointed as a Lecturer in 1982 and promoted to Senior Grade in 1990.

He obtained an M.Phil. in 1993 and a Ph.D. in 1998.

The College initially proposed his placement as Lecturer (Selection Grade) from 25.10.1995, but the University approved it only from 25.10.1997, granting one year’s relaxation for the M.Phil.

He retired on 31.05.2001.

In 2017, he sought promotion from 25.10.1994, relying on a 1990 Government Order allowing service relaxation for research degrees.

Following a direction to consider his representation, the University rejected it in 2018.

The Single Judge allowed his writ petition and directed promotion from 25.10.1994; the University appealed.

Whether the respondent’s claim for retrospective promotion, first pursued by representation in 2017 after his retirement in 2001, was barred by delay and laches.

Whether the claim could be treated as a continuing cause of action, or revived by the Court’s earlier direction to consider the representation and the University’s subsequent decision.

Although Article 226 prescribes no limitation period, a service claim must be brought within a reasonable time; courts may refuse relief where a claimant sleeps on the claim and seeks to unsettle settled service matters.

P.S. Sadasivaswamy v. State of Tamil Nadu explains that delayed challenges to promotion should ordinarily be rejected, while C. Jacob v. Director of Geology and Mining and Union of India v. M.K. Sarkar establish that a direction to consider a stale representation, or its rejection, does not revive a dead claim or create a fresh cause of action.

Under Union of India v. Tarsem Singh, a continuing wrong may permit relief despite delay, but claims involving promotion or rights affecting others may be barred where reopening would unsettle settled rights.

A continuing wrong requires a continuing breach of an obligation, not merely the continuing effects of a completed act.

The Court held that the respondent’s promotion had been approved from 25.10.1997 and that he neither challenged that decision contemporaneously nor raised the claim before retiring in 2001.

His first relevant representation was made in 2017, more than sixteen years after retirement.

The prior direction to consider the representation did not determine the merits or revive the stale claim; nor did the University’s decision on it create a fresh cause of action.

The Court rejected the continuing-cause argument because the promotion claim was not shown to have remained a subsisting cause of action throughout the intervening period.

It therefore found that the Single Judge had erred in granting relief without properly addressing delay and laches.

The writ appeal was allowed, the Single Judge’s judgment was set aside, and the writ petition was dismissed.