JUDGMENT

(Prayer: Petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, praying to issue a Writ of Certiorarified Mandamus, to call for the records of the respondent 1 and 2 in connection with the impugned proceedings bearing Ref.No.21380/nf1/2016, dated 07.06.2016 and consequential impugned seniority list bearing Ref.No.18/nf1/2018, dated 02.02.2018 and quash the same in so far as Mr.R.Sridhar SI.No.113 in the impugned seniority and others like him in the seniority list up to SI.No.239, have been placed above the petitioners and direct the respondents 1 and 2 to treat the petitioners as seniors to the 3rd respondent and others of the same class and accordingly, direct the respondents 1 & 2, to issue orders of promotion to the post of Sub-Registrar Grade II for the petitioners.)

1. This writ petition has been filed to issue a writ of Certiorarified Mandamus, to call for the records of the respondent 1 and 2 in connection with the impugned proceedings bearing Ref.No.21380/nf1/2016, dated 07.06.2016 and consequential impugned seniority list bearing Ref.No.18/nf1/2018, dated 02.02.2018 and quash the same in so far as Mr.R.Sridhar SI.No.113 in the impugned seniority and others like him in the seniority list up to SI.No.239, have been placed above the petitioners and direct the respondents 1 and 2 to treat the petitioners as seniors to the 3rd respondent and others of the same class and accordingly, direct the respondents 1 & 2, to issue orders of promotion to the post of Sub-Registrar Grade II for the petitioners.

2. The age old and the never ending controversy in the service jurisprudential landscape, constantly engaging the attention of the Courts over six decades, is the fixation of inter se seniority between direct recruits and promotees. The fixated controversy refusing to die down despite the rulings of this Court in multitude of litigations over the years and each time, when a resolution is found by the Courts, yet, the dispute manifests in variegated and kaleidoscopic form, shape and colour, from time to time and bounce back to the Courts seeking its attention all over again. The Courts painstaking efforts notwithstanding in laying down definite legal principles on the vexed issue, nevertheless, the dispute crawl back re-engaging the Courts, every now and then, at various points of time. The issue has been constantly engaging the attention of the Courts periodically for the last few decades, despite a Constitution Bench judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court formulating the legal principles to be applied to various contingencies that may arise in the matter of inter se fixation of seniority as between direct recruits and promotees. Finding a panacea has always been elusive, a conundrum each time and any order, direction or ruling on the issue, hold the field only upto a transitional point of time. It gets a new avatar after sometime and land on the lap of the Courts for its intervention, again and again interminably, having no end at all.

3. The present dispute is one more to be added to the multitude of litigations, yearning for judicial remedy. The petitioners herein are the direct recruits and the respondents 3 to 22 are the promotees at loggerheads in the matter of fixation of inter se seniority between them.

4. The brief facts which led to the filing of the present writ petition are stated hereunder:

(i) According to the petitioners, they are directly recruited Assistants working in the registration department. The private respondents 3 to 22 are rank promotees from the post of Junior Assistants. The petitioners were recruit