Compassionate appointment claims filed years after retirement are barred by delay and the governing scheme.

The petitioner’s father, a railway employee, retired on March 1, 1977.

The petitioner claimed compassionate appointment under a Railway Board circular dated February 13, 1974, on the ground that his father had been a loyal employee who worked during the 1974 strike.

The petitioner’s mother first applied on his behalf in 1986, when he was a minor; the petitioner also applied that year.

His first Tribunal application, filed in 1989, was dismissed for default in 1990, and restoration was sought only in 2013.

After the Railway authorities rejected a later representation in 2015, the petitioner filed O.A. No. 1533 of 2016, dismissed by the Tribunal on July 19, 2022 as hopelessly belated.

He then filed this writ petition four years later.

1. Whether the petitioner was entitled to compassionate appointment under the 1974 circular, including in light of the Railway scheme permitting certain claims by minor dependants to remain pending.

2. Whether the Tribunal’s dismissal of the petitioner’s claim as hopelessly belated warranted interference, given the delay in making the initial application and in pursuing the proceedings.

Compassionate appointment is an exception to the constitutional guarantees of equality and equal opportunity in public employment under Articles 14 and 16, and is a concession—not an inheritable or vested right—available only in accordance with the governing scheme.

Its purpose is to provide timely assistance to a family facing immediate financial distress; an application made after an unreasonable delay may support the inference that the family was not in immediate need.

Courts cannot direct appointment contrary to the applicable scheme.

These principles were drawn from Canara Bank v. Ajithkumar G.K., (2025) 11 SCC 178.

The Railway instructions dated April 30, 1979, referred to in the document dated May 14, 1979, allowed a minor dependant’s claim to remain pending only for five years, with a possible relaxation by the General Manager in specified cases involving death or permanent disability in the course of duty.

The petitioner’s first application was made about nine years after his father’s retirement, too late to demonstrate a contemporaneous need for immediate relief and outside the five-year period in the Railway instructions, even assuming those instructions applied to his claim.

His minority did not displace the scheme’s time limit, and the record did not place his father’s case within the specified category for possible extension.

The petitioner also allowed his first Tribunal application to be dismissed for default and waited 23 years to seek restoration; he filed the present writ petition four years after the Tribunal’s 2022 order without explaining the delay.

Those delays independently supported the Tribunal’s conclusion.

The Court therefore found it unnecessary to determine whether the father had retired prematurely, since the nine-year delay would defeat the claim in any event.

It dismissed the writ petition and declined to interfere with the Tribunal’s order; no costs were awarded.