Impleadment of a few affected is sufficient compliance of principle of joinder of parties; Non-joining of all parties cannot be fatal: Supreme Court

"...impleadment of a few of the affected employees would be sufficient compliance of the principle of joinder of parties and they could defend the interest of all affected persons in their representative capacity. Non-joining of all the parties cannot be held to be fatal", held the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

The Court further remarked that in matters relating to service jurisprudence, it is not essential to implead each and every one who could be affected but if a section of such affected employees is impleaded then the interest of all is represented and protected.

These observations were made by the top court while allowing appeals filed against the judgement and order passed by Division Bench of the Allahabad High Court whereby it had set aside the judgment of the Single Judge and dismissed the writ petition  filed by a few Junior Engineers in the Department of Minor Irrigation, State of Uttar Pradesh, being aggrieved by the final seniority list.

In the instant case, the appellants belonged to the Mechanical and Civil Streams whereas private respondents were from the Agriculture Stream.

The Chief Engineer, Department of Minor Irrigation had sent a requisition in 1998 to the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission requesting for recruiting 206 posts of Junior Engineers in the Department of Minor Irrigation which were divided between agriculture, mechanical and civil streams in the ratio of 50:30:20 respectively.

An Advertisement was then issued inviting applications and after finalizing the results, the Commission forwarded three separate select lists to the Minor Irrigation Department of the State Government. Based upon the three select lists forwarded by the Commission the appointment letter was issued on October 8, 2001, which clearly indicated that the issue regarding seniority would be decided later on.

A seniority list was published in 2006  with respect to all the Junior Engineers appointed after January 1, 1989 and later in 2009, the Department took a fresh exercise of preparing the seniority list as the Rules relating to Junior Engineers were framed by the Minor Irrigation Department for the first time.

An office order dated March 5, 2010 was issued which stated that the Commission had sent three separate lists i.e. of Agricultural stream on September 28, 1999, Mechanical stream on January 6, 2000 and Civil stream on November 7, 2000 and the candidates of the three lists were placed by the Department in the same sequence as they were received with their inter se seniority in their respective lists.

This came to be challenged before the High Court.

The Single Judge, had allowed the writ petition, and had quashed the seniority lists while directing the respondents to draw a fresh seniority list in accordance with Rule 5 of the Uttar Pradesh Government Servants Seniority Rules, 1991 (Rules 1991).

It had further directed that any promotions made during the pendency of the writ petitions would not be interfered with but would remain subject to the fresh seniority list to be prepared in accordance with Rule 5. 

The Division Bench, on the other hand, dismissed the writ had observing that there was extraordinary delay on the part of the writ petitioners in approaching the Court in as much as the seniority list of 2006 which had formed the basis of the 2009 seniority list, was not challenged within a reasonable time.

It had further observed that since all the affected Junior Engineers had not been impleaded, it would be fatal on the principle of non-joinder of necessary parties. 

A bench of Justices DY Chandrachud, Vikram Nath and BV Nagarathna disagreed with the view taken by the Division Bench.

" ...whether it was Rule 5 which was applicable or Rule 8 which was applicable, the seniority inter se of direct recruits to one selection has to be one combined list based on the performance and the marks awarded in the examination prepared either by the Commission or the Committee, as the case may be.", added the Court.

The court further noted that there was no lis inter se between direct recruits and promotees.

With this view, the appeals were allowed.

Cause Title: Ajay Kumar Shukla And Others v. Arvind Rai And Others