( 1 ) THE petitioners in their Writ Petition under Article 32 of the Constitution challenged the action of the respondents in terminating their services as ad hoc Assistant Medical Officers on the plea that they were ad hoc appointees and replacing them by freshly recruited Assistant Divisional Medical Officers, and prayed for the issue of a direction to the respondents to treat the appointments of the petitioners as regular with effect from the dates of their respective appoinmeiits as ad hoc Assistant Medical Officers and to assign them consequent seniority in the grades.

( 2 ) IT was contended by the petitioners that they were appointed as ad hoc Assistant Medical Officers (Class II) during the period August 198 3/07/1986 in the South-Eastern, North-East Frontier and Northern Zones of the Indian Railways and had been officiating in the said grade for periods ranging up to four years. Although the initial appointments were for a period of six months, the respondents had extended their tenure from time to time. Instead of regularising the services of the petitioners and conferring the benefits of seniority, the respondents had threatened to terminate their services as and when the