Employees of Railway Institutes and Clubs are not Railway employees; absorption claims are not maintainable.

The applicant claimed that he had been engaged since 2004 as a casual labourer/chowkidar under the Entertainment Institute, North Eastern Railway, Mailani, and had received progressively enhanced monthly remuneration, ultimately stated to be ₹2,000, through cheques issued by the Institute.

Relying on a North Eastern Railway letter dated 15 September 1979 concerning screening and absorption of casual labourers against Class-IV posts, he sought consideration for absorption against a Group-D railway vacancy and payment of arrears.

The respondents contested maintainability, asserting that the Entertainment Institute was a recreation club, not a Railway establishment; that the applicant had neither been appointed by the Railway Department nor paid from the Consolidated Fund of India; and that no employer–employee relationship existed between him and the Railways.

The applicant relied on payment cheques, a Railway letter dated 18 May 2015, and certificates issued by the Recreation Club.

The respondents relied principally on All India Railway Institute Employees v. Union of India, 1990 AIR 952, and Sanjay Maseeh v. Union of India & Ors., OA No. 294 of 2018, CAT Lucknow Bench.

Whether the Original Application seeking absorption in the Railway Department was maintainable before the Central Administrative Tribunal in the absence of an employer–employee relationship between the applicant and the Railway Administration.

Whether the applicant was entitled to claim screening and absorption under the North Eastern Railway letter dated 15 September 1979 concerning casual labourers and Group-D posts.

Whether the applicant’s engagement under the Entertainment Institute established appointment or employment by the Railway Department.

The Tribunal applied the principle laid down by the Supreme Court in All India Railway Institute Employees v. Union of India, 1990 AIR 952, that employees of Railway Institutes and Clubs do not, merely by virtue of their engagement in such institutions, have an employer–employee relationship with the Railway Administration; their wages are paid by the Institutes or Clubs, which are funded through membership fees and welfare grants, and their remedy lies elsewhere.

The Tribunal also relied on Sanjay Maseeh v. Union of India & Ors., OA No. 294 of 2018, for the proposition that, in the absence of an appointment order issued by a competent Railway authority, a claim against the Railways lacks merit.

The 15 September 1979 Railway letter prescribed conditions for screening, including the specified computation of 500 days of service, with service up to 30 October 1973 to be calculated at one-half and subsequent service in full.

The Tribunal found that the applicant had been engaged by the Entertainment Institute and that the remuneration cheques had been issued by an authorised functionary of the Institute, not by the Railway Department.

The absence of any Railway appointment order, payment from the Consolidated Fund of India, or other material establishing direct employment defeated the claim of an employer–employee relationship.

Applying the Supreme Court’s distinction between Railway canteens and Railway Institutes/Clubs, the Tribunal held that Institutes and Clubs are optional welfare establishments funded primarily through membership fees and grants, and their staff are not thereby converted into Railway employees.

Independently, the 1979 letter could not assist the applicant because he claimed engagement only from 2004, whereas paragraph 3.4.1 prescribed a method of computation linked to service rendered up to and after 30 October 1973.

Since the claim was not maintainable and the applicant was not a Railway employee, the Tribunal declined to examine the merits of his absorption claim.

The Original Application was accordingly dismissed as devoid of merit and not maintainable. No order was made as to costs, and all connected miscellaneous applications were disposed of.