Seniority cannot run from an appointment date preceding mandatory medical fitness certification.

The applicant, K. Kulasekaran, joined the Department of Information and Publicity as a Public Relations Assistant on 30 March 2001.

Respondent 3, S. Gunasekaran, was appointed as a Sub-Editor and shown as having joined on 29 March 2001; his medical fitness certificate was produced on 30 March 2001.

A seniority list prepared following an earlier Tribunal order placed Gunasekaran above Balaji and the applicant.

The applicant challenged the 2017 seniority memorandum, contending that Gunasekaran’s effective date of entry could not precede completion of the medical fitness requirement.

Whether Gunasekaran’s date of entry into service could be reckoned as 29 March 2001, given that he produced his medical fitness certificate on 30 March 2001.

Whether the inter-se seniority list should be reconsidered where the applicant and Gunasekaran were both eligible to enter service only from 30 March 2001.

Fundamental Rule 10 requires a person entering Government service in a pensionable establishment to be medically examined and found fit before joining.

Direct Recruit Class II Engineering Officers’ Association v. State of Maharashtra, (1990) 2 SCC 715, establishes that seniority ordinarily runs from appointment made according to the applicable rules, not confirmation; qualifying officiating service may count where the appointment procedure was not followed but service continued uninterruptedly until regularisation.

D.P. Das v. Union of India, (2011) 8 MAD LJ 1074, states that, where candidates are recommended on the same date and no combined merit list or applicable rule resolves seniority, age may provide a fair basis.

The Tribunal also relied on Avinash Singh v. Union of India and Naveen Kumar Jha v. Union of India for the principle that selection-based seniority should not be displaced merely by fortuitous differences in joining dates, particularly where the delay is not attributable to the candidate.

The Tribunal found that although the records showed Gunasekaran’s appointment date as 29 March 2001, he produced the medical fitness certificate required for first appointment only on 30 March 2001.

The applicant and Balaji were likewise recorded as joining on 30 March 2001.

The Tribunal therefore held that Gunasekaran’s earlier recorded date, without completion of the medical requirement, could not alone confer a seniority advantage over the applicant; both should be treated as entering service effectively on 30 March 2001.

It directed that seniority be determined thereafter under the applicable service rules and in accordance with law, rather than itself fixing the applicant’s final rank.

The exercise was to be completed within three months of receipt of the order; no costs were awarded.