The court established that contract employees were entitled to be considered first for regularisation as per the rules, and the issuance of the advertisement for recruitment was arbitrary.

( 1 ) ON 29. 01. 1991, the State Government created Greater Noida Industrial Development authority. In furtherance of its objects, the Authority appointed a large number of persons on a contract basis on account of fact that the State Government did not create or sanctioned the post. Subsequently, Greater Noida Industrial Development Authority Service Regulation 1993- were framed which gave the Authority the power to appoint employees on a contract basis. Based on this, a large number of persons were appointed on a contract basis for 89 days. The petitioner was also appointed as an Assistant Manager on 23. 11. 1994 on a contract basis. The appointment letter stipulated that the appointment is only for 89 days on a fixed pay which would come to an end on the expiry of the period and that, the appointment- could be extended from time to time if there was a requirement of work and that the appointment was purely temporary in nature and that no claim of security or for the regularisation in the authority could be claimed by the employee.

( 2 ) IT transpires that after the creation of Greater Noida Authority, the State Government sanctioned 154 posts. On 11. 4. 2001, the State Government sanctioned another 126 posts which was to be filled up by way of promotion or on a contract basis from those persons who were surplus in other departments of Greater Noida Authority and, if there were no surplus employees, in that event, by direct recruitment on a contract basis.

( 3 ) BASED on the aforesaid, a note was put up by the Incharge Officer (Personal) proposing to give a contract for 3 years instead of 89 days. By a letter dated 4. 7. 2002, the Deputy Chief Executive officer wrote to the. State Government intimating that 27 persons on contract basis remained in the Authority and sought permission to regularise their services in view of the vacancies existing in the Authority. While this matter was pending before the State Government, the Authority issued an advertisement, inviting applications for various posts, including 5 posts of Assistant manager. Consequently,. the petitioner filed the present writ petition for the quashing of the advertisement dated 20. 11. 2002 in so far as it related to the recruitment on the post of Assistant manager and further prayed that the authority be directed to regularise his services on the post of an Assistant Manager.

( 4 ) SIMILARLY situated employees have also filed several writ petition praying for the same relief. These employees were also working on a contract basis on the same post or on some other post and are also aggrieved by the advertisement and their non regularisation of their services. Since the issue raised in all the writ petitions is common, the same is being decided together. For facility, the writ petition of Sarvendra Kumar is being taken as the leading case.

( 5 ) THE petitioner in paragraph Nos. 3 to 6 of the writ petition has submitted that he was initially appointed as an Assistant Manager for 89 days and, since then he had been working continuously, except for the artificial break of 1 or 2 days, when fresh appointment letters were issued. In paragraph No. 7 and 9 of the writ petition, the petitioner had contended that out of 44 employees appointed on a contract basis on various posts, 17 employees have been regularised by the authority on various dates between the period 1991 to 1999. In paragraph Nos. 8 and 17, it has been stated that 28 posts of Assistant Manager had been sanctioned and that 18 persons are working as Assistant Manager and that 10 posts are still vacant. In paragraph No. 15 of the writ petition, the petitioner submitted that U. P. Regularisation of Ad-hoc Appointment (on posts outside the purview of the Public Service Commission) Rules 1979, as amended from time to time, was applicable to the petitioner and that, under these rules, the petitioner was liable to be regularised since vacancies are existing and that the petitioner was working c