Inclusion in a replacement panel confers no indefeasible right to appointment once vacancies are reduced.

The applicants applied for Group ‘D’ posts in the North Eastern Railway (NER) under Advertisement No. NER/RRC/D/2007/1 dated 06.12.2007. They successfully cleared the physical, written, and medical examinations but were placed in a 20% extra/replacement panel rather than the main select list

The applicants contended that 593 posts remained vacant due to non-joining or medical unfitness of main-list candidates and argued that the respondents arbitrarily reduced the number of vacancies by surrendering 500 Trackman posts midway through the process

Following several rounds of litigation, including a remand from the Allahabad High Court (Writ A No. 8561 of 2021), the matter was reheard to determine if the applicants were entitled to appointment against allegedly unfilled vacancies from the 2007 recruitment cycle

1. Whether the ratio laid down by the Supreme Court in Dinesh Kumar Kashyap v. South East Central Railway, regarding the appointment of candidates from a 20% extra panel, is applicable to the 2007 recruitment cycle

2. Whether the respondents acted arbitrarily or illegally by surrendering 500 advertised vacancies during the selection process

3. Whether placement in a replacement panel after a long lapse of time and expiry of the panel's life creates an indefeasible right to appointment

The court primarily applied the principle from Shankarsan Dash v. Union of India, which establishes that inclusion in a select list does not confer an indefeasible right to appointment and that the State is not legally bound to fill all vacancies unless rules specifically dictate otherwise

The court relied on the Constitution Bench decision in Tej Prakash Pathak v. Rajasthan High Court, which permits modification of vacancy numbers during recruitment if the advertisement or rules expressly allow such changes

It further considered Dinesh Kumar Kashyap v. SECR, distinguishing it as applicable only to specific litigants of the 2010 recruitment cycle, and referenced Ashish Kumar v. Union of India, which holds that no relief can be granted once the life of a select list has expired

The Tribunal analyzed the 2007 advertisement and found that Paragraph 14.1 explicitly reserved the right to increase or decrease vacancies, thus surrendering 500 posts for the Construction Division was not a "change in terms" but an exercise of a pre-notified condition

The court reasoned that the Dinesh Kumar Kashyap judgment was restricted to the 2010 recruitment and could not be extended to the 2007 cycle, especially as the Supreme Court had limited relief in that case to "vigilant" litigants who approached the court within a specific timeframe

Regarding the "assurance" of appointment, the Tribunal noted that the respondents’ communications were conditional upon the demand from units and did not override the merit-based ranking where the applicants were lower than the last selected candidate

Finally, the Tribunal found that since the life of the select list had ended and several subsequent recruitment cycles (2010, 2012, 2018) had already been conducted, the 2007 panel could not be treated as a "perpetual reservoir" for appointments

The court concluded that the reduction of vacancies was legally permissible under the terms of the advertisement and that the selection process for the 2007 cycle had attained finality. The Tribunal affirmed the impugned order dated 12.09.2019, ruling that the applicants, being lower in merit and part of a now-expired replacement panel, were not entitled to any relief