State Must Extend Benefits of Jndgments in Rem to All Similarly Situated Employees Without Discrimination.

The petitioners, Assistants working in Ordnance Factories and the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB), filed contempt petitions alleging willful disobedience of a judgment dated 14.10.2014 passed in W.P.(C) 4606/2013

That judgment directed the respondents to grant Assistants in Ordnance Factories historical pay parity with Assistants in CSS/CSSS and Army Headquarters with effect from the same date

Despite the order categorically covering "all similarly placed persons," the respondents failed to extend these benefits to the petitioners

The respondents contested the petitions on grounds of delay/laches and alleged lack of historical pay parity for this specific set of employees

1. Whether the respondents are bound to extend the benefits of a prior judicial pronouncement to similarly situated employees who were not original parties to the litigation

2. Whether the exception of "laches and delay" applies to fence-sitters in matters involving a continuing cause of action and judgments in rem

The court relied on the principle that when a particular set of employees is granted relief, all identically situated persons must be treated alike under Article 14 of the Constitution to avoid discrimination

Girish Mittal v. Parvati V. Sundaram, establishing that contempt petitions are maintainable by aggrieved parties even if they weren't parties to the original judgment if the directions were general

State of U.P. v. Arvind Kumar Srivastava, distinguishing between judgments in personam and judgments in rem, noting that state instrumentalities should extend benefits to all similarly placed employees without forcing individual litigation

Lt. Col. Suprita Chandel v. Union of India, which held that the government should not penalize employees for not litigating earlier if they are identically situated

The court reasoned that the 14.10.2014 judgment was comprehensive and intended to maintain historical parity across all organizations where employees had identical pay scales, using "Ordnance Factories" as an illustrative rather than exhaustive category

The Court rejected the respondents' plea of "laches," finding that the denial of pay parity constitutes a continuing cause of action and that the petitioners had been diligently pursuing the matter with the authorities

Regarding the respondents' claim that no parity existed, the Court held that the rationale in the original 2014 judgment already negated this argument, specifically finding that historical parity was a recognized fact across these ministerial/secretarial posts

Consequently, the Court determined that the respondents' refusal to apply the policy uniformly was a failure to comply with the overarching terms of the original decree

The Court directed compliance within 12 weeks, with a compliance affidavit to be filed within 8 weeks thereafter. any further non-compliance would be treated as an egregious breach and willful disobedience, entailing fresh action under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971