Bombay HC Protects Two Compassionate Appointees From Cancellation After Nearly 20 Years, Finding Their Fathers’ Posts Were Group C

The petitioners were appointed on compassionate grounds in 2004 and 2008, respectively, after the deaths in service of their fathers.

The State later issued show-cause notices proposing cancellation of their appointments on the ground that their fathers’ posts, carrying the pay-scale of Rs. 6,500–10,500, were Group-B posts and therefore outside the compassionate-appointment policy then in force.

The petitioners challenged the notices before the Maharashtra Administrative Tribunal, which dismissed their applications; they then filed these writ petitions.

Both had completed probation and remained in service while the challenges were pending.

They relied on subsequent Government Resolutions that classified the Group Instructor post as Group C and disputed the classification of the Training Officer post as Group B.

At the relevant time, the State’s compassionate-appointment policy applied to eligible dependants of Group-C and Group-D employees.

The court considered the Government Resolutions dated 22 October 2008, 31 March 2010, 14 May 2010 and 31 August 2010, which classified the Group Instructor post as Group C.

It also relied on Md. Zamil Ahmed v. State of Bihar, (2016) 12 SCC 342, for the principle that the State cannot, after a long lapse of time, terminate a compassionate appointment on account of its own error where the appointee committed no fraud, manipulation or suppression of material facts.

Compassionate appointment is an exception to ordinary recruitment intended to alleviate the immediate financial hardship caused by an employee’s death; an appointment and the appointee’s right to continue in service cannot be withdrawn except in accordance with law.

The respondents’ proposed action rested on the pay-scale and the 2002 Government Resolution, but the court held that these could not be considered in isolation from the later resolutions specifically classifying the Group Instructor post as Group C; those resolutions had not been withdrawn, superseded or set aside, and the respondents had not reconciled them with the departmental letter of 19 May 2010.

As to the second petitioner, the respondents failed to establish a valid basis for treating his father’s post as Group B.

The petitioners had served for approximately two decades, and no fraud or misrepresentation was alleged; in those circumstances, cancellation would cause disproportionate hardship and would impermissibly allow the State to rely on its own alleged error.

The 2021 Government Resolution extending compassionate appointment to Groups A and B was not treated as retrospectively determining classification or as the source of entitlement.

It set aside the Tribunal’s judgment insofar as it dismissed their applications, allowed both writ petitions in terms of prayer clauses (a)–(d), and made the Rule absolute, with no order as to costs.

The decision was expressly confined to its particular facts and circumstances and was not to be treated as a precedent for other matters.