Compassionate appointment must be governed by rules applicable at the employee’s death, not subsequent amendments.

The petitioner’s father died in service on 31 March 2015.

The petitioner applied for appointment under the Rehabilitation Assistance Scheme on 1 July 2015 and was found eligible for appointment against a Group-C post under the Orissa Civil Services (Rehabilitation Assistance) Rules, 1990.

He was appointed as a contractual Junior Assistant, a Group-C post, by order dated 11 March 2020 and joined on the same day.

Subsequently, the Directorate of Geology cancelled the appointment on 1 July 2020, and the consequential authority cancelled it on 2 July 2020, relying on the OCS (RA) Amended Rules, 2020, notified in February 2020.

The petitioner was thereafter appointed to a Group-D Peon post and joined on 6 July 2020 under protest.

Whether the petitioner’s appointment to the Group-C post, arising from an application made in 2015 under the OCS (RA) Rules, 1990, could be cancelled by applying the OCS (RA) Amended Rules, 2020?

Whether an appointment under the OCS (RA) Rules, 1990 could validly be made on a contractual basis, and whether the petitioner was entitled to regular appointment to the Group-C post of Junior Assistant?

Whether the petitioner’s subsequent appointment to a Group-D post extinguished his claim to the Group-C post and consequential service benefits?

The Court applied the Orissa Civil Services (Rehabilitation Assistance) Rules, 1990, holding that the petitioner’s claim was required to be considered under the Rules applicable when his father died and he applied for appointment in 2015.

The Court held that the subsequently notified OCS (RA) Amended Rules, 2020 could not be relied upon to revoke the benefit already extended to the petitioner in relation to his 2015 claim.

It further relied on Biplab Kumar Sahu v. State of Odisha & Others, W.P.(C)(OAC) No. 2062 of 2017 and batch, for the principle that an administrative clarification cannot override statutory rules and that an appointment wrongly issued on a contractual basis under the Rehabilitation Assistance Scheme must be regularised from the initial date of appointment.

Article 226 of the Constitution empowered the Court to quash the impugned administrative orders and grant appropriate consequential relief.

The Court treated the petitioner’s eligibility as arising from the death of his father and the application made in 2015, when the 1990 Rules governed the claim.

Although the appointment order was issued in March 2020 after notification of the amended Rules, the Court held that the authorities could not retrospectively apply the amended regime to cancel an appointment granted pursuant to the earlier claim.

The Court also found that the 1990 Rules contained no provision for contractual appointment under the Rehabilitation Assistance Scheme.

Applying the principle in Biplab Kumar Sahu, it concluded that the petitioner’s contractual appointment as Junior Assistant was legally required to be treated as a regular appointment from 11 March 2020, rather than being cancelled and replaced with a Group-D appointment.

His joining the Peon post under protest did not waive his entitlement, particularly as the petitioner had expressly objected to the Group-D appointment.

It directed Opposite Party No. 2 to treat the petitioner as having been regularly appointed to the Group-C post of Junior Assistant from 11 March 2020, the date of his original appointment order.

The authorities were further directed to release the differential service and financial benefits admissible to him, after accounting for his subsequent joining as a Peon, and to complete the exercise within two months of receiving the judgment.

The writ petition was accordingly disposed of.