In a writ appeal filed before the Madhya Pradesh High Court against an order dated 25-03-2025, whereby the State was directed to frame a policy regarding the regularisation of daily rated employees, a Division Bench of Justice Vivek Rusia and Justice Pradeep Mittal refused to interfere with the impugned order.
Respondents 1 and 2 had challenged the inaction of the Registrar, Maharaja Chhatrasal Bundelkhand Vishwavidhyalya, Chhatarpur, regarding non-regularisation of their respective posts after serving for more than 10 years. The impugned order was in two parts. The first part was regarding the direction issued to the Registrar, Maharaja Chhatrasal Bundelkhand Vishwavidyalaya, Chhatarpur (respondent 3) to consider the writ petitioner’s claim for regularisation. Whereas, the second part was related to the direction given to the state government to frame a policy concerning the regularisation of daily rated employees.
The first part was complied with by the University, rejecting the writ petitioner’s claim by an order dated 04-05-2026. Regarding the second part, the State government, through the General Administration Department (GAD) and the Higher Education Department, had filed the present writ appeal challenging the said direction. The State contended that in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in State of Karnataka v. Uma Devi (2006) 4 SCC 1, illegal appointments cannot be regularised even by framing a policy by the government.
Despite Uma Devi (supra), the State government continued to engage large numbers of daily rated employees and since more than 20 years had passed, all such employees had developed legitimate expectations of regularisation in the services. The government came up with the Viniyamitikaran Policy, cancelling all its earlier policies framed for regularisation. Under this policy, Annexure A mandated that daily rated employees and ‘Sthai Karmi’ shall be given one opportunity for regularisation into service through a selection to be undertaken in terms of the Madhya Pradesh Kanisth Seva (Sanyukt Arhata) Niyam, 2013, by constituting a Committee.
Keeping in view the facts and circumstances, the Court stated that the writ court had rightly directed the State government to frame a comprehensive policy to deal with all such matters related to regularisation which were pending by way of writ petitions. It was said that after Uma Devi (supra), the State government should have imposed a complete ban on the engagement of daily rated employees, which was unfortunately, not done.
Upon perusing a letter dated 08-02-2025, the Court found that the government was seriously considering framing a comprehensive policy in light of the judgments in Union of India v. K. Velajagan 2025 SCC OnLine SC 837 and Shripal & Anr. v. Nagar Nigam, Ghaziabad 2025 INSC 144. The Court stated that additionally, the judgment in Jaggo v. Union of India & Ors. 2024 SCC OnLine SC 3826, was also liable to be considered.
Hence, the Court refused to interfere with the impugned order and held that the policy framed pursuant to the judgment in Uma Devi (supra) needs to be reframed by the State of M.P., considering the developments.
