Invoking Rajdharma and Bhagavad Gita, Punjab and Haryana High Court orders regularisation of long-serving daily wagers

Image reflecting the aspects of court order. (image is created using AI)

The court also highlighted that the Bhagvad Gita acts as an “interpretive lamp” that illuminates why a welfare state cannot, in good conscience or good law, keep citizens in endless precarity while taking uninterrupted benefit of their service.

“When the State engages people to serve the public, often in the lowest rungs, with the least bargaining power, it must remember that governance is not merely about outputs but it is also about how those outputs are produced,” the order read.

Justice Moudgil pointed out that where state action results in “unequal civil consequences”, the court is duty-bound to examine not merely the form but the substance of the decision-making process.

“In a constitutional democracy, the State does not function as a private employer free to hire and discharge personnel at will; rather, it acts as a trustee of public power,” the court added.

The high court directed that the petitioners’ claims for regularisation and held that the judgment should govern all connected matters with similar facts.

The court also directed the department concerned to regularise the petitioners according to the law and under the relevant regularisation policy in force when the petitioners first became eligible.

‘No illegal appointment’

Referring to the various decisions of the apex court on similar matters, the court also highlighted that public employment must conform to Articles 14 (equality before law) and 16 (equality of opportunity) of the Constitution.

However, the court also highlighted that the entry to public employment can neither be through the back door, nor can the court convert an “illegal appointment” into a “legal right” merely because time has passed.

‘Three decades of long, continuous service’

The court noted that the daily workers have worked in the department concerned for nearly three decades, and their work and conduct have never been found wanting.

It was further pointed out that despite the existence of multiple regularisation policies and regularisation of similarly placed employees, the claims of the petitioners were neither meaningfully considered nor decided, even upon a formal representation.

‘Delay, laches’

Responding to the contention that the petition suffers from delay and latches since the petitioners approached the court after more than ten years, the court said that the state is a model employer and expected to act as a “parent” towards its employees, especially where the employees belong to an illiterate class and the lowest strata of society.

“In such circumstances, the State is expected to act promptly and not allow its officials to remain in a state of inaction, thereby compelling employees to approach the Court for enforcement of their legal rights, which otherwise ought to have been considered in due course on the basis of the record available,” the order read.

Therefore, the court dismissed the plea of delay and laches, finding it “misconceived” and cannot be permitted to defeat the substantive and accrued rights of the petitioners.

Arguments

• Their clients have been serving the department concerned as daily wage workers since the year 1996 and have continued to work with the department for a substantial period.
• They have discharged their duties to the “satisfaction” of the authorities.
• Petitioners were performing duties of a “perennial” nature, which are essential for the department’s functioning and therefore their engagement cannot be treated as “casual or temporary” in nature for an indefinite period.
• The authorities have failed to take any decision regarding the regularisation of his services despite the availability of regularisation policies, which amounts to arbitrariness.

On the contrary, one of the state’s representatives, additional advocate general Deepak Balyan, submitted some of these arguments praying dismissal of the petitions:

• The petition is not maintainable as the daily wage workers failed to specify under which particular regularisation policy of the state government they claim entitlement for regularisation of their service.
• Petitioners’ engagement was purely on a daily wage basis for performing miscellaneous labour work and not against a specific post.
• Their service records reflect that their engagement was “intermittent” and marked by several breaks, thereby disentitling them from claiming “continuity of service” as required under the regularisation policies.
• The petition suffers from “gross delay and laches”, and the petitioners have approached this court after an “inordinate and unexplained delay”.