JUDGMENT :

1. Heard Sri. Subhanshu Chauhan, learned counsel for the appellants and Sri. Vijay Kumar Srivastava along with Sri. Gopal Singh Bisht, learned counsel for the respondents.

2. These special appeals have been filed by the U.P. State Sugar Corporation Ltd. through its Managing Director hereinafter referred to as ‘the Corporation’ challenging a common judgment rendered by the writ court on 14.10.2019 in a bunch of writ petitions, the leading Writ Petition being No. 47 (S/B) (Now Service Single) of 2014 (Ravi Shankar Mishra vs. State of U.P.).

3. The facts of the case, in brief, are that the respondents herein are erstwhile employees of the appellant-corporation. A scheme of voluntary retirement was floated on 13.10.2009 (Page No. 76 of the Special Appeal) in pursuance to which, they applied for voluntary retirement which was accepted. Accordingly, they retired voluntarily. It is informed that they had an option to continue with the company which was purchasing the sugar mills of the appellant-Corporation but the respondents did not choose to do so, instead, they applied for voluntary retirement which was accepted. The nineteen respondents in these nineteen appeals, retired on 3