( 1 ) THE perpetual rivalry for seniority in service between the direct recruits and the promotees has once more engaged the attention of this Court for several days. The dispute which was brought to Court by S- B. Patwardhan in 1972 by a writ petition in the bombay High Court and which was supposed to have been finally settled by the judgment of this Court reported in S. B. Pstwardhan v State of Maharashtra (1977 3 SCC 399): (1977)3scr 775, has been kept alive by some direct recruits till this date. The events relevant for the case are spread overa long period and the issues joined by the patties have been described in the earlrer judgments as involving ticklish and complicated question of unrivalled complexity with no earlier case comparable. The position as now stands in that the field of controversy on legal questions has been considerably narrowed down by the earlier decieions of this Court, but the relevant facts and the issues to be settled have multiplied by further events and subsequent rules framed under the Proviso to Article 309 of the Constitution.

( 2 ) FOR appreciating the controversy which has to be resolved, a briefsurvey of several sets of rules i