Exhaustion of statutory remedies and counter-obligation of authorities to decide pending representations before seeking judicial review.

The applicant, originally a Constable in the Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) since 01.01.2006, was sent on deputation to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2010 and subsequently absorbed into the NIA on 13.10.2014.

Currently serving as a Head Constable, the applicant seeks to have his past service in the SSB (from 2006 to 2014) counted as regular service for the purpose of promotion to Head Constable and Assistant Sub Inspector in the NIA.

He submitted a representation dated 05.01.2026 to the respondents to address this grievance, which remains pending.

The Registry initially raised an objection that the application was premature as the representation was recent.

1. Whether the application is premature under the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985, given the pending representation.

2. Whether the applicant is entitled to the reckoning of past service in an analogous post in a parent department for promotion in the absorbed department.

Section 20 of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985, which mandates that a Tribunal shall not ordinarily admit an application unless all available departmental remedies/representations have been exhausted.

Section 20(2)(b) allows an applicant to approach the Tribunal if six months have passed without a decision on a representation, it also imposes a counter-obligation on the authorities to decide such representations to avoid unnecessary litigation.

K. Madhavan vs Union of India (1987) 4 SCC 566 regarding the counting of analogous service for promotion.

The Tribunal observed that the applicant’s grievance regarding service seniority and promotion is currently the subject of a pending representation before the National Investigation Agency.

Relying on Section 20 of the Act and various internal precedents (e.g., Meer Singh v. UOI and Devl Dutt Sharma v. UOI), the Bench determined that the application was technically premature as the administrative remedy had not been fully exhausted.

The court emphasized that to maintain parity with similar cases (such as Vijay Kumar Singh v. NIA) and to ensure the efficiency of the legal process, the competent authority is duty-bound to pass a reasoned order on the representation.

The court declined to rule on the merits of the SSB service-counting claim at this stage to allow the executive to first exercise its decision-making power.

It directed the Competent Authority (NIA) to consider and decide the applicant’s representation dated 05.01.2026 by passing a reasoned and speaking order within four weeks of receiving the judgment. The OA was disposed of at the admission stage without a decision on the merits of the promotion claim.