ORDER :

I.A. Nos. 3, 4, 7 & 8 have been filed praying for impleadment in the civil appeal as party respondents. The applicants claimed that they are senior officers and become eligible for promotion to the post. We have heard learned counsel for the applicants and permit them to intervene in the matter.

2. Civil Appeal No. 4156 of 2008 had been filed against the judgment and order dated 12.09.2005 of the High Court of Andhra Pradesh by which judgment the writ petition filed by the appellants challenging the order of the Central Administrative Tribunal, Hyderabad Bench, Hyderabad, dated 13.11.2003 was dismissed. The brief facts of the case as emerged from the pleadings of the parties are as follows :

3. The respondents were employed as Geophysicists in Geological Survey of India, a subordinate Department of Ministry of Mines. The post of Assistant Geophysicists was a group-B post and next grade in the said cadre is the post of Geophysicists (Jr.) Group-A. The promotion of Assistant Geophysicists was by two modes i.e., by direct recruitment and by promotion through UPSC with ratio of 1:1. There were large number of posts of Geophysicists (Jr.) lying vacant from 1984 till 1998 totalling