JUDGMENT

DESAI, J. :— Would Article 16 of the Constitution come to the rescue and be successfully invoked by appellants, admittedly juniors in the gradation list of Subordinate Judges in the State of Himachal Pradesh to respondents 3, 4 and 5, questioning the legality and validity of their promotion to the cadre of District/Additional District & Sessions Judges (DSJ/ADSJ for short), as also questioning the legality and validity of promotion of respondents 6 and 7 to the selection grade post of Subordinate Judge ?

2. Uncontroverted facts are that Himachal Pradesh was a Union Territory till January 25, 1971, when at the apex of judicial hierarchy there was a Court of Judicial Commissioner. On the introduction of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966, (Reorganisation Act for short) effective from November 1, 1966, certain territories were transferred and added to the Union Territory of Himachal Pradesh simultaneously extending the jurisdiction of the Court of Judicial Commissioner of Himachal Pradesh to the transferred territories. Consequently, provision was made for allocation of persons belonging to different services in pre-reorganised State of Punjab (Respondents 4 to 7 being such