Daily-rated service neither confers retrospective regularisation nor pensionary credit absent applicable scheme conditions.

The concerned workmen were engaged by the CPWD as casual/daily-rated employees and served for varying periods before being regularised against sanctioned vacancies on different dates.

They claimed that their pre-regularisation service should be counted with their regular service for retiral benefits, relying on continuous service under Section 25-B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, the CPWD’s alleged regularisation criteria, and the Casual Labourers (Grant of Temporary Status and Regularisation) Scheme, 1993.

The Ministry of Labour referred the disputes to the Central Government Industrial Tribunal under Section 10 of the Industrial Disputes Act, specifically concerning the counting of daily-rated service for retiral benefits.

By a common Award dated 2 January 2007, the Tribunal directed the CPWD to confer regular status after one year of initial engagement and to count 50% of the daily-rated service for retiral benefits.

The CPWD challenged the Award under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution.

Whether the Tribunal could direct that the workmen be conferred regular status retrospectively after one year of their initial daily-rated engagement, in the absence of a statutory rule, recruitment rule, Government order, or binding scheme authorising such regularisation?

Whether completion of 240 days of service or continuous service under Section 25-B of the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, by itself conferred a right to regularisation or retrospective regular status?

Whether 50% of the entire period of pre-regularisation daily-rated service could be counted for retiral benefits under the 1993 Temporary Status Scheme or any other applicable pensionary provision?

Whether the Tribunal had properly examined the individual service records and the eligibility of each workman under the 1993 Scheme and Rule 14 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972?

The Court applied the supervisory, non-appellate jurisdiction under Articles 226 and 227, under which interference with an Industrial Tribunal’s award is warranted for jurisdictional error, breach of natural justice, findings unsupported by evidence, or an error of law apparent on the face of the record, but not merely because another factual view is possible.

Under Secretary, State of Karnataka v. Umadevi (3), (2006) 4 SCC 1, regularisation is not a mode of recruitment and length of casual or daily-wage service cannot itself create a right to regular appointment; the limited exception requires, inter alia, duly qualified persons working against sanctioned vacant posts.

Registrar General of India v. V. Thippa Setty, (1998) 8 SCC 690, establishes that regularisation ordinarily operates prospectively unless a specific legal foundation authorises retrospective effect.

Gangadhar Pillai v. Siemens Ltd., (2007) 1 SCC 533, holds that completion of 240 days does not by itself confer a right to regularisation or permanent status.

Section 25-B of the Industrial Disputes Act defines continuous service for purposes of that statute but does not independently convert daily-rated service into qualifying pensionable service.

Under the 1993 Scheme, Clause 4(i) concerns eligibility for temporary status, while Clause 5(v) permits counting of 50% of service rendered under temporary status towards retirement benefits after regularisation; it does not apply automatically to the entire period of casual or daily-rated service.

The Court also recognised that Rule 14 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972, read with the applicable Government decision, may independently apply where its conditions concerning the nature, payment, continuity, and absorption of service are satisfied.

The Tribunal’s direction granting regular status after one year lacked legal foundation.

The workmen were initially engaged without sanctioned posts and were regularised only later, on different dates, when vacancies became available; therefore, neither their length of service nor completion of 240 days could retrospectively transform their engagement into regular Government service.

The Tribunal had also improperly relied on Railway rules and Articles 12 and 39(d) to create a CPWD pensionary entitlement, despite identifying no applicable CPWD rule or binding scheme.

However, the Court treated retiral benefits as a distinct question from retrospective regularisation.

The Tribunal’s blanket direction to count 50% of the entire daily-rated service was unsustainable because Clause 5(v) of the 1993 Scheme applies only to service rendered under temporary status, and eligibility depended on individual facts such as the workman’s status on 10 September 1993, satisfaction of the 240/206-day requirement, actual conferment or recognition of temporary status, and the date of regularisation.

The Tribunal had not undertaken that workman-wise examination, nor considered the possible application of Rule 14.

In view of the exceptional delay of more than nineteen years, instead of remanding the matters, the Court moulded relief as a special measure confined to the workmen before it.

The dates of regularisation were not to be antedated, and completion of 240 days or prolonged daily-rated service was held insufficient, by itself, to confer regular status or justify retrospective regularisation.

A workman already regularised before 10 September 1993 could not claim earlier daily-rated service under the 1993 Scheme.

For a workman who remained in casual/daily-rated employment on 10 September 1993 and was subsequently regularised, retiral benefits were to be recomputed by taking into account 50% of service rendered from 10 September 1993 until regularisation, only to the extent that such service was reckonable under the 1993 Scheme; any independent claim under Rule 14 was to be considered according to law.

The directions were expressly confined to the workmen involved in the proceedings, were not to be treated as a general entitlement for daily-rated employees, and were to be implemented within three months.