A tribunal order following applicants’ own submission warrants no interference absent grounds.

The petitioners, retired employees who had initially worked on a daily-wage basis, applied to the Karnataka State Administrative Tribunal (KSAT) for their service to be counted from their initial appointments until retirement and for consequential benefits.

They relied on Netram Sahu v. State of Chhattisgarh.

The KSAT dismissed their applications on 28 July 2022, having regard to earlier orders dismissing similar applications; the petitioners challenged that dismissal under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution.

The petition invoked the High Court’s supervisory and writ jurisdiction under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution.

The petitioners relied on Netram Sahu v. State of Chhattisgarh, Civil Appeal No. 1254 of 2018, as support for their claim to count service from initial daily-wage appointment.

Its decision rested on the procedural circumstances that the KSAT had disposed of the applications in terms of prior orders and that the related writ petition challenging one such order had also been dismissed.

The High Court noted that the petitioners’ counsel had asked the KSAT to dispose of the applications in terms of earlier orders dismissing similar applications. The KSAT had accordingly passed the impugned order.

The High Court also recorded that the writ petition challenging one of those earlier KSAT orders had been dismissed on the same day. In those circumstances, it found no ground to interfere; it did not independently assess whether the petitioners’ daily-wage service qualified for counting or consequential benefits.

It reserved liberty to the petitioners to make an application for payment of gratuity.