Judgment :-

Aftab Alam, J.

1. Leave granted in all the special leave petitions.

2. All the appeals are at the instance of a Regional Rural Bank, namely, Rushikulya Gramya Bank, and the matter relates to promotion from one scale to another. Out of the eight appeals, six relate to promotion from Junior Management Scale-I to Middle Management Scale-II and in the remaining two appeals (arising from SLP (Civil) No.17974 of 2008 and SLP(civil) No.18898 of 2008), the matter relates to promotion from Clerk to Junior Management Scale-I.

3. The short question that arises in these appeals is whether it is open to the management of the Bank to lay down a benchmark, besides the criteria fixed by the rules for grant of promotion on seniority-cum-merit basis.

4. The appellant - bank issued a circular No.024/2004-05, dated June 23, 2004 notifying the vacancies inter alia in the seventeen posts of Middle Management Scale-II and eight posts of Junior Management Scale-I. The circular stated that the process of promotion shall be conducted as per the promotion rules of the Government of India. For promotion to the post of Middle Management Scale-II, the zone of consideration was four times the number of va