The appointment of similarly situated persons under available vacancies can distinguish a case from precedents and influence the court's decision on regularization.

JUDGMENT

1. Since same question of law on almost identical facts is involved in all these writ petitions, the same are being decided by this common order.

2. For the decision making process, the facts of SB Civil Writ Petition No.17675/2015 (Hukum Singh v. State Personnel Department & Anr.) are dealt with as a lead case which shall be applied mutatis mutandis in other connected writ petitions.

3. The petitioner was initially appointed as a Class IV employee on 08/07/1989 on daily wages basis. The claim of the petitioner is that he has discharged more than 20 years of service and 12 other persons were also assigned various duties as Class IV employees with the respondents. The similarly situated persons filed various writ petitions before this Court and the same were allowed and such similarly situated persons were regularized in service vide order dated 17/03/2001 (Annexure 2). The petitioners earlier filed SB Civil Writ Petition No.9979/2007 before this Court praying for salary in regular pay-scale for the post of Class IV servant and regularization of his services. During pendency of the said writ petition, the Rajasthan Class IV Service (Recruitment and other Service Conditions) Rules 1999 were amended and new sub-rule 6(4) was added to Rule 6 vide notification dated 27/02/2009. The writ petition was allowed by the Court vide order dated 19/11/2010 and thereafter an order was passed by the Chief Manager of the respondent stating that initial appointment of the petitioner was not against vacant post but was on daily wages basis in Mess Fund and at that time there existed no regular sanctioned post and therefore, it was not possible to regularize services of the petitioner as per amendment dated 27/02/2009. The petitioner filed a contempt petition which was dismissed vide order dated 09/12/2014 but this Court, while dismissing the contempt petition gave liberty to the petitioner to avail remedy as available under law. The petitioner was not considered by the Screening Committee as is evident from the office note dated 05/06/2013 (Annexure-9).

4. During pendency of the instant writ petition, the petitioner filed one application whereby it was contended that in identical set of writ petitions titled as Prahlad Gujar & Ors. v. Director, Harish Chandra Mathur, Rajasthan State Institute of Public Administration (SB Civil Writ Petition No.6361/2015), the coordinate Bench of this Court vide order dated 03/02/2021 allowed the writ petitions of five other similarly situated persons directing the respondents therein to immediately pass orders within seven days for compliance of the Division Bench's order for regularization of their services from the date they are entitled to i.e. from the date the High Court directed in the earlier litigation from 01/11/2000 i.e. from the date the posts were lying vacant with the respondents. The respondents have complied with the said order dated 03/02/2021 by passing order dated 24/03/2021 (Annexure-12).

5. It is noticed from perusal of the order dated 03/02/2021 passed by the coordinate Bench in the writ petition of similarly situated persons that on a specific query raised from the respondents' counsel by the coordinate Bench, a specific affidavit was filed by the respondents stating that 12 vacancies of Class-IV were lying vacant. The coordinate Bench directed the Registrar (Judicial) of this Court for taking necessary action against the concerned officers of the respondents under Section 340 Cr.P.C. for filing false affidavit.

6. Learned counsel for the respondents was not able to distinguish the order dated 03/02/2021 passed by the coordinate Bench of this Court and about the other similarly situated persons having been appointed on the post of Class IV category in RIPA. Learned counsel for the respondents has also placed reliance upon a judgment rendered by the Apex Court in Union of India v. ILMO Devi & Anr. reported in AIR 2021 SC 4855 decided on 07.10.2021, more particularly para 8.8 which reads a