The Supreme Court has directed the regularisation of services of several daily-wage workers engaged with the Income Tax Department at Gwalior, holding that they were entitled to the same treatment as similarly placed workers whose services had earlier been regularised pursuant to Supreme Court orders.
The bench of Justice J.K. Maheshwari and Justice Atul S. Chandurkar set aside a 2019 judgment of the Madhya Pradesh High Court and an earlier order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), Jabalpur Bench, which had denied regularisation to the appellants.
Background of the Case
The appellants, registered with the Employment Exchange, had been engaged as casual workers with the Office of the Commissioner of Income Tax, Gwalior, since the 1990s. Appellants Nos. 1 to 3 were engaged as sweepers between 1997 and 1998, while Appellant No. 4 was engaged as a cook in 1993. They contended that they were appointed after due sponsorship and interview, and had continued to discharge perennial and essential functions of the department for decades.
Seeking regularisation, the workers first approached the CAT in 2012. Their claim was rejected in 2015 on the ground that they did not satisfy the condition laid down in Secretary, State of Karnataka v. Umadevi (3), which permits one-time regularisation only for employees who had completed ten years of continuous service as on 10 April 2006. The High Court affirmed this view in 2019.
Aggrieved, the workers approached the Supreme Court.
Parity with Earlier Supreme Court Beneficiaries
Before the Supreme Court, the appellants relied heavily on Ravi Verma v. Union of India, where casual employees of the Income Tax Department appointed in the 1993–94 period were directed to be regularised with effect from 1 July 2006. The Court in that case had found that similarly situated workers in other regions had already been regularised and that denying the benefit to the appellants amounted to discrimination.
The present Bench noted that the names of the current appellants appeared in the same official lists of daily-wage workers (dated 31 October 2005, 11 November 2005, and 31 January 2008) as those whose services were regularised in Ravi Verma. This factual parity, the Court held, left no room for differential treatment.
The Bench also referred to Raman Kumar v. Union of India, where regularisation was again ordered for similarly placed workers of the Income Tax Department by applying the principle of non-discrimination.
Outsourcing Cannot Defeat Legitimate Claims
The appellants argued that the department had begun outsourcing the very work performed by them, demonstrating that the work was perennial in nature and that outsourcing was being used as a device to avoid regularisation.
Accepting this contention, the Court drew support from Jaggo v. Union of India, which clarified that employees engaged in “irregular” (but not illegal) appointments, who perform essential and continuous duties, should not be denied regularisation merely because of procedural defects at the time of initial engagement.
The Court reiterated that Umadevi was intended to prevent backdoor and illegal appointments, not to penalise employees who have served the State for decades in indispensable roles.
Findings and Directions
The Bench held that both the Tribunal and the High Court erred in mechanically applying Umadevi to reject the appellants’ claims, despite clear evidence of parity with workers already regularised under Supreme Court directions.
The Court set aside the High Court’s judgment dated 26 August 2019 and directed that the services of the appellants be regularised with effect from 1 July 2006, on the same terms as in Ravi Verma and Raman Kumar.
The court ordered that all consequential benefits be released within three months and extended the same relief to impleaded party respondents who were similarly situated.
Case Details
Case Title: Pawan Kumar & Ors. Versus Union Of India & Ors.
Case No.: SLP (C) NO.29214 OF 2019
Date: 13/02/2026
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