Eligible employees are entitled to SRO-based higher pay fixation, with arrears limited to three years before filing.

The 27 applicants were initially engaged as daily-rated workers in the Public Health Engineering Department and asserted that they performed highly skilled duties.

They were later regularized as Helpers in the pay scale of Rs. 750–940, but claimed entitlement to higher pay scales under the relevant SROs, including placement in the scale of Rs. 1200–2040, with consequential arrears.

Departmental authorities had considered their claim and made recommendations, but the applicants were not granted the claimed benefits.

The matter originated as SWP No. 1114/2013 before the Jammu and Kashmir High Court and was transferred to the Tribunal.

Whether the applicants were entitled, subject to the applicable eligibility conditions, to higher pay-scale benefits under the relevant SRO provisions, having regard to their asserted classification and duties as highly skilled workers.

Whether the applicants’ monetary arrears should be limited because of delay, and, if so, what period of arrears was recoverable.

The Tribunal applied the relevant SRO provisions, including SRO 149, in light of the High Court’s ruling in Provincial Power Employees Union of India & Ors. v. State of J&K & Ors., which recognized eligible employees’ entitlement to the benefit and directed parity in revised pay scales; the Tribunal noted that the Supreme Court dismissed the State’s appeal against that ruling.

It also relied on Article 14’s prohibition against arbitrary differential treatment of similarly situated employees.

Under Union of India v. Tarsem Singh, (2008) 8 SCC 648, a continuing pay-related wrong may support relief despite delay, but monetary arrears may ordinarily be restricted to three years preceding the filing of the petition.

The Tribunal also referred to the High Court’s ruling concerning SRO 59, which prohibited recovery of amounts already paid in the circumstances addressed there while permitting pay or pension refixation to exclude benefits wrongly granted.

The Tribunal considered the applicants’ claimed skilled-worker classification, their regularization, muster-roll records and departmental recommendations relevant to determining their individual entitlements.

It held that the legal position on benefits for eligible, similarly situated employees had been settled by the High Court and affirmed on appeal, and that the respondents could not disregard that position or treat comparable employees differently without lawful justification.

It nevertheless made relief conditional on verification of each applicant’s service particulars and satisfaction of the applicable eligibility conditions.

Applying Tarsem Singh, it distinguished notional pay fixation from actual arrears and limited the latter to the three years preceding the filing of the 2013 writ petition.

It directed the respondents to determine and fix or refix each eligible applicant’s pay in the appropriate scales from the applicable date, grant notional fixation from that date, and pay actual arrears only for the three years preceding the filing of SWP No. 1114/2013, together with admissible consequential and retiral benefits.

The exercise and payment were to be completed within three months of receipt of a certified copy of the order; no costs were awarded.