Long-serving, directly engaged casual workers performing perennial duties are entitled to regularization.

The petitioners had been directly engaged by the Intelligence Bureau (“IB”) between 1998 and 2003 as daily-rated casual workers for loading and unloading, upkeep of office rooms, disposal of shredded papers, and other manual work. They were paid from the IB’s office contingency fund and continued in service for approximately two decades through periodic renewals and artificial breaks.

In February 2021, the IB decided to procure similar manpower services through the Government e-Marketplace (“GeM”) and informed the petitioners that they would have to obtain re-employment through the contractor selected through GeM.

The petitioners challenged this proposed arrangement before the Central Administrative Tribunal. The Tribunal declined to interfere, holding that procurement through GeM was authorised under Rule 149 of the General Financial Rules, 2017, but directed the respondents to consider engaging the petitioners through the GeM contractor on humanitarian grounds.

Whether the petitioners, despite being described as daily-rated casual workers, were entitled to regularisation after approximately two decades of continuous service directly under the IB.

Whether the IB could discontinue the petitioners’ direct engagement and require them to seek employment through a private contractor appointed through the GeM portal.

What consequential benefits, including pay fixation, continuity, back wages, and seniority, were payable upon regularisation.

The Court applied the principles laid down by the Supreme Court in Jaggo v. Union of India, Shripal v. Nagar Nigam, Vinod Kumar v. Union of India, Dharam Singh v. State of U.P., and Bhola Nath v. State of Jharkhand, as followed by the Delhi High Court in Pawan Sharma v. Govt. of NCT of Delhi, New Delhi Municipal Council v. Kalpana Sharma, and Om Prakash Gaur v. Delhi Technological University.

Under these authorities, employees are entitled to regularisation where they were selected through a process broadly mirroring regular recruitment, worked continuously for several years, and performed duties essential or perennial to the establishment; the initial description of their engagement as casual, contractual, part-time, temporary, or ad hoc is not decisive.

The Court also relied on Articles 141 and 144 of the Constitution, requiring subordinate courts to follow and give effect to binding Supreme Court precedent.

Rule 149 of the General Financial Rules, 2017, concerning mandatory procurement of goods and services available on GeM, was considered in the context of the Tribunal’s reasoning, but was not treated as defeating the petitioners’ accrued rights to regularisation.

The Court held that the petitioners’ direct engagement by the IB, uninterrupted service for more than twenty years, repeated contractual renewals, and performance of routine and day-to-day functions demonstrated that their work was perennial and not dispensable.

The respondents had not alleged that the petitioners’ appointments were illegal, mala fide, surreptitious, or through the “back door”.

Applying Pawan Sharma and the Supreme Court authorities, the Court held that the labels “daily-rated,” “casual,” or “contractual” could not be used to defeat the petitioners’ substantive entitlement to regularisation after the IB had continuously extracted their services for decades.

The proposed shift to a GeM-based contractor could not therefore be used to displace the petitioners or convert their long-standing direct relationship with the IB into outsourced employment.

The Court also applied the limitation recognised in the Supreme Court’s affirmation of Pawan Sharma: regularisation would not disturb the seniority of persons regularly appointed during the intervening period.

The petitioners were directed to be regularised against the posts held by them, with regularisation operating from the dates of their initial appointments and consequential benefits such as pay fixation and continuity of service.

They were not granted additional back wages beyond amounts already paid, and were entitled to parity of pay with regular employees performing equivalent duties.

However, they would not receive seniority over persons recruited regularly to similar posts by the IB during the period of their contractual engagement.