Group D Safaiwalas listed as eligible cannot be excluded from clerical selection based on department.

The applicants, regularised Safaiwala (Group D) employees in the Commercial and Medical Departments respectively, applied for promotion to Clerk-cum-Typist under a notification dated 7 November 2016.

They were excluded from the eligibility list on the ground that they did not work in administrative offices, although the notification listed Safaiwala as an eligible category.

By interim order, they were permitted to sit the examination provisionally, and their results were placed in sealed cover.

The respondents later stated that both applicants had been promoted as Junior Clerks and had received further promotions in the ordinary course.

Whether the applicants were eligible to participate in the 7 November 2016 selection despite working in the Commercial and Medical Departments rather than administrative offices.

Whether the applicants’ sealed-cover results should be opened and, if they qualified, consequential notional benefits granted.

The Tribunal applied the terms of the selection notification dated 7 November 2016, which listed “Bhishti/Safaiwala” among the eligible categories and was addressed to all officers of the Lucknow Division.

No statute, regulation, or judicial precedent was cited.

The governing principle was that eligibility must be determined by the notification’s stated categories; an additional administrative-office restriction could not be imposed where the notification did not provide for it.

The notification expressly included Safaiwala among the eligible categories and applied to the Lucknow Division.

The applicants’ departmental postings therefore did not make them ineligible on the stated ground that they were not working in administrative offices.

Since they had participated provisionally and their results were in sealed cover, the Tribunal directed that the results be opened and linked any further relief to whether they had qualified.

It directed the respondents to open their sealed-cover results and, if either applicant had qualified, grant that applicant notional benefits at par with other successful candidates within three months of receiving a certified copy of the order.

Pending miscellaneous applications were disposed of, and the parties were directed to bear their own costs.