Karnataka HC Quashes Veterinary University’s Rejection Of 3 Contract Workers’ Regularisation Pleas, Orders Reconsideration Within Six Weeks

The petitioners stated that they had worked on contract with the respondent University from 2012 in different non-teaching roles against sanctioned posts.

After the University rejected their request for regularisation by endorsement dated 21 January 2025, they sought to quash it and obtain regularisation and related salary benefits.

The University disputed the claim but conceded that the Karnataka State Civil Services (Prohibition of Absorption of Services of the Employees of Establishments in Public Sector into Public Services) Act, 2020 did not apply to the petitioners and that the endorsement gave no other reason for rejecting their request.

The petitioners relied on earlier proceedings concerning similarly situated University employees, including Nagendra and the Supreme Court’s order in Civil Appeal No. 5586 of 2024.

The Court relied on the principles governing regularisation discussed in State of Karnataka v. Umadevi and its subsequent application in Nagendra v. Karnataka Veterinary Animal & Fisheries Sciences University, W.P. No. 34001 of 2019, affirmed in W.A. No. 1185 of 2021.

In Nagendra, the Court directed the University to consider the employees’ cases in light of the applicable law and the circumstances of their appointments and service; the Supreme Court subsequently directed regularisation of those appellants in Civil Appeal No. 5586 of 2024.

The Court also relied on its decision in Smt. Lakshmi v. Karnataka Veterinary Animal and Fisheries Sciences University, W.P. No. 7911 of 2026.

The University conceded that the 2020 Act did not apply to these petitioners.

The endorsement was unsustainable because it rejected the claim without a reasoned assessment and relied on a statutory bar that the University accepted did not apply to the petitioners.

The University had also failed to address the prior decisions concerning its contractual employees, including the directions in Nagendra and the Supreme Court’s subsequent order, or the Court’s decision in Lakshmi.

In these circumstances, the Court quashed the endorsement and directed reconsideration by reference to those decisions; it did not itself order the petitioners’ regularisation.

The endorsement dated 21 January 2025 was quashed, and the University was directed to reconsider the petitioners’ regularisation claims in light of Nagendra, the related Division Bench and Supreme Court decisions, and Lakshmi, and to pass appropriate orders within six weeks of receiving the order.

Until then, the University was restrained from taking precipitative or coercive steps against the petitioners; the parties retained liberty to pursue other remedies available in law.