Same-batch appointees are entitled to equal regularization, subject to vacancies, seniority, and eligibility.

The petitioners were among 12 consolidated workers engaged by the J&K Board of School Education under an order dated 9 May 2007.

In earlier proceedings, the Court directed regularization of similarly situated workers as Class IV employees against available vacancies, subject to eligibility, with notional effect from the date regularization became due.

The Division Bench subsequently held that its decision covered the batch of 12 workers, including persons who had not been petitioners in the earlier writ proceedings.

After the petitioners obtained a direction to have their claims considered in light of that judgment, the Board rejected their claims, relying on the liberty to fill remaining vacancies through regular recruitment.

The petitioners challenged the rejection order.

1. Whether the Board’s rejection of the petitioners’ regularization claims was consistent with the earlier judgments concerning workers engaged under the same 9 May 2007 order.

2. Whether the petitioners’ regularization was subject to the availability of vacancies, their inter se seniority and fulfillment of eligibility criteria.

The Court applied the directions in Saleem Ali v. State of J&K (SWP No. 1806/2012), which required regularization as Class IV against available vacancies, subject to eligibility, with notional effect from the date regularization became due.

It also relied on the Division Bench orders in LPASW Nos. 208/2017 and 223/2017, which held that the benefit extended to the batch of 12 workers engaged under the 9 May 2007 order, including workers who had not been petitioners in the earlier writ proceedings.

Persons forming part of the same engagement batch were not to be treated differently; regularization remained subject to available vacancies, seniority and eligibility.

The petitioners were part of the same 12-person engagement batch covered by the Division Bench’s decisions.

The Board therefore could not distinguish them from other members of that batch.

The Court held that the reference to filling “remaining vacancies” through regular recruitment did not defeat the claims of batch members who had been held entitled to the same treatment.

The Board’s rejection misread the earlier judgment and was inconsistent with its own engagement order and prior position on priority consideration.

The Court nevertheless made regularization conditional on vacancies, inter se seniority and eligibility.

Regularization is to take notional effect from the date it became due, without arrears, and the exercise must be completed within eight weeks.

The Board may fill remaining vacancies through the regular process.

The benefit is confined to the petitioners on the record of these proceedings; the disputed Srinagar petition is not to operate to their benefit or prejudice.