Engagement on a contractual basis in project-specific roles does not confer rights to permanency, and long service cannot override express terms of engagement.

ORDER :

Heard Sri M.Srikanth, learned counsel for the petitioners; Sri B.Mukherjee, learned counsel representing Sri N.Bhujanga Rao, learned Deputy Solicitor General of India appearing for respondent No.1; and Sri N.Bharatiya Sudarshan, learned counsel appearing for respondent No.3 and perused the record.

2. In the present writ petition, the petitioners challenge the order dated 14.08.2025 passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal, Hyderabad, in O.A.No.1144 of 2018, whereby the Tribunal dismissed the Original Application (for short ‘OA’) filed by the petitioners and vacated the interim order dated 20.11.2018. The petitioners, who were engaged as project staff on contract basis by the 2^nd respondent – National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (for short ‘NIRDPR’) seek a writ of Mandamus to quash the Tribunal’s order, declare their termination illegal, arbitrary, and violative of Articles 14, 16, and 21 of the Constitution, and to direct their reinstatement with continuity of service and equal remuneration.

Factual matrix (in brief)

3. The petitioners were engaged by NIRDPR between 1995 and 2012 in various project-based capacities, including Project Assistant, Senior Project Assistant, Training Manager, and Assistant Manager (Accounts). Petitioners’ appointments made exclusively on contract and linked to specific sanctioned projects, were governed by terms clearly stipulating that the engagement was temporary, project-specific, and conferred no right to regularisation or permanency, as reflected in the appointment orders and extensions (Annexures P-12 to P-16).

4. On 24.01.2018, NIRDPR issued Standing Order No. 816/2018, prescribing that project staff could be engaged only for the duration of the sanctioned project and, in any event, not beyond three years. Relying on this Standing Order, the respondents proposed to discontinue the petitioners’ services, resulting in the petitioners to approach the Tribunal in O.A.No.1144 of 2018 challenging the Standing Order and seeking continuation. The Tribunal initially granted an interim order dated 20.11.2018. However, upon final adjudication, the Tribunal dismissed the said O.A No.1144 of 2018 by order dated 14.08.2025 and vacated the interim order dated 20.11.2018.

5. Following the dismissal of the said O.A.No.1144 of 2018, by order dated 14.08.2025 and without waiting for the order to be uploaded and made available to the petitioners, the respondents issued termination orders dated 19.08.2025 to the petitioners in office order Nos.327, 328, 329 and 330.

6. Aggrieved by the order dated 14.08.2025 and the termination orders issued by the respondents dated 19.08.2025, the petitioners herein filed W.P.No.26941 of 2025. The Co-ordinate Bench of this Court by order dated 10.09.2025 kept in abeyance the discontinuation of the services of the petitioners till the order passed by the Tribunal dated 14.08.2025 is uploaded. Upon the Tribunal’s order being uploaded, the respondents relieved the petitioners from service.

Contentions on behalf of the petitioners

7. Learned counsel for the petitioners submitted that the petitioners have rendered long, continuous, and uninterrupted service from about 13 to 30 years. The learned counsel contended that the initial engagement of the petitioners was through a regular selection process, comprising advertisement and interview, and they were appointed to the regular centres of NIRDPR rather than to any single project. Petitioners’ services were utilised across multiple assignments based on administr