Long-serving contractual employees meeting statutory criteria cannot be denied consideration for regularization.

The petitioner had been working in the library of the Advocate General’s Office as a contractual Junior Assistant since July 2007, according to the noting of the Advocate General, and had continuously discharged her duties without a break.

She was paid the minimum of the pay scale applicable to a regular Junior Assistant from 2010.

Respondent No. 2 issued an order dated 16 October 2023 directing her to enroll with an outsourcing agency and submit the relevant details, failing which her services would be deemed to have been automatically terminated; a further notice was issued on 31 October 2023.

The petitioner challenged the outsourcing direction and sought regularization as Assistant Librarian or, alternatively, as Junior Assistant.

Respondent No. 2 disputed the date of engagement, asserting that she had applied for contractual engagement only on 8 December 2009, but admitted her continued service and payment of the minimum pay scale of a regular Junior Assistant.

The State contended that no post of Assistant Librarian was sanctioned and that the Advocate General’s Office Establishment Rules, 2013 did not provide for such a post.

The petitioner relied on the Daily Wage, Work-Charged, Fixed-Pay, Part-Time and Ad-hoc Employees Regularisation (Amendment) Rules, 2025, which prescribed 4 December 2018 as the relevant cut-off date and required ten years of continuous service by that date.

Whether the respondents could require the petitioner, who had been continuously working as a contractual Junior Assistant, to shift to an outsourcing agency on pain of automatic termination of her services

Whether the petitioner was entitled to consideration for regularization as Junior Assistant or against any equivalent Class-III post under the applicable regularization rules

Whether the Advocate General or respondent No. 2 had the authority to consider the petitioner’s regularization as Junior Assistant

The Court applied the Uttarakhand Advocate General Office Establishment (Service of Employees) Rules, 2013, under which the Advocate General was the appointing authority for the post of Junior Assistant.

It also applied the Regularisation Rules of 2013, as amended in 2025 by the Daily Wage, Work-Charged, Fixed-Pay, Part-Time and Ad-hoc Employees Regularisation (Amendment) Rules, 2025, under which an employee completing ten years of continuous service by 4 December 2018 fell within the prescribed eligibility framework.

The Court further relied on the principles that a continuously engaged contractual employee performing perennial and necessary work cannot be arbitrarily displaced or subjected to outsourcing after prolonged service, particularly where the employer has treated the employee as performing duties equivalent to those of a regular post.

No judicial precedent was cited in the judgment.

The Court treated the Advocate General’s noting recording the petitioner’s service from July 2007, together with respondent No. 2’s admission of her continuous work and payment of the minimum Junior Assistant pay scale, as sufficient to establish her prolonged engagement.

On that basis, the petitioner had completed more than ten years of service by the 4 December 2018 cut-off date and was therefore entitled to consideration under the applicable regularization framework.

The Court held that the absence of a sanctioned post of Assistant Librarian did not defeat her claim because she could be considered against the post of Junior Assistant or another available Class-III post.

It further rejected the contention that the Advocate General lacked authority, holding that the 2013 Rules made the Advocate General the appointing authority for Junior Assistants.

In view of the petitioner’s nearly nineteen years of continuous service and the perennial nature of her duties, requiring her to join an outsourcing agency and threatening automatic termination was found unsustainable.

The order dated 16 October 2023 and the notice dated 31 October 2023 were quashed insofar as they related to the petitioner.

Respondent No. 2 was directed to consider the petitioner’s case for regularization as a Junior Assistant in the library or against any other available Class-III post in the Advocate General’s Office, within two months from production of a certified copy of the judgment.

The Court thus granted protection against the impugned outsourcing-based termination and directed consideration of regularization, but did not itself issue a final order regularizing the petitioner.