JUDGMENT

UNTWALIA, J.:—This is an appeal by certificate granted by the 679 Andhra Pradesh High Court. The facts of the case are almost identical to those in the case of General Manager, South Central Rly. Secundrabad v. A. V. R. Siddhanti, (1974) 3 SCR 207 all the 33 respondents in this case at the relevant time, as in the other case, were the employees of the Grainshop Establishment of the Railway Administration in this case the Southern Railway. After the closing of the grain shop establishment, all the respondents were allotted to South Central Railway with the formation of that zone. They belonged to either one or the other of the three categories of the different sources from which the staff for the temporary grain shop complex was drawn. In the case of Central Railway v. Siddhanti (supra) the employee had prayed under Article 226 of the Constitution in the High Court for the issue of a writ of mandamus directing the railway authorities to fix the inner se seniority of the writ petitioners as per original proceedings dated October 16, 1952 of the Railway Board and not to give effect to the subsequent proceedings dated November 2, 1957 and January 13, 1961 of the Board issued b