A person appointed through a placement agency has no privity of contract with the principal employer (government) and therefore possesses no vested legal right to continue in service or seek regularization against the government.

Order

This writ petition is filed assailing the action of the respondents whereby, they orally removed the petitioner from the services working on the post of Nursing Officer.

The relevant facts in brief, as borne from the memo of writ petition, are that vide letter dated 01.08.2024 written by the respondent No.7- Riza Enterprises, his name was sent to the Medical Officer In-Charge, Community Health Centre, Gudhaliya, Block Bandikui, District Dausa to work as a Nursing Officer (temporary), pursuant whereupon, he joined his duty on 01.08.2024. He worked till 25.08.2024 whereafter, the respondents removed him from service without following the due process of law.

Reiterating the averments made in the writ petition, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that his removal is bad in law as he is sought to be replaced by another contractual employee. He, therefore, prays that the writ petition be allowed, oral termination of his services be quashed and set aside and the respondents be directed to reinstate him back in service.

Heard. Considered.

Indisputably, there was no privity of contract in between the petitioner and the official respondents. Services of the petitioner were hired by a private placement agency and were placed at the disposal of the official respondents. The writ petition is bereft of any specific averment that he has been removed from service under the verbal instructions of the official respondents and it is not the placement agency which has withdrawn its services. Be as it may, in identical circumstances, a co-ordinate Bench of this Court has, in the case of Amita Singh Vs. State of Rajasthan And Ors. : S.B. Civil Writ Petition No.4381/2024 and other connected matters, vide its order dated 23.04.2024, held that a person appointed through a placement agency has no right to continue in service. The relevant extract of the judgment reads as under:

4.1 That the petitioners were appointed as contractual employees.

4.2 That the petitioners have categorically failed to place on record any appointment letter issued in favour of the petitioners by the respondent-JDA, exhibiting the terms and conditions of their engagement etc.

4.3 That the petitioner is merely a third-party and alien to the contract which was primarily entered into between the respondent-JDA and respondent no.3-Contractor, which had engaged the services of the petitioners.

4.4 That privity of contract subsisted only between the respondent-JDA and the concerned placement agency/contractor(respondent no.3).

5. The Hon’ble Apex Court in K.K. Suresh and Anr. vs. Food Corporation of India reported in AIR 2018 SC 3905, has categorically held that contractual engagement does not create a vested right of employment in favour of the workers, engaged through a placement agency. The relevant extract of the said judgment is reproduced herein under:-

“In the first place, the Appellants failed to adduce any evidence to prove existence of any relationship between them and the FCI; Second, when the documents on record showed that the Appellants were appointed by the FCI Head Load Workers Co-Operative Society but not by the FCI then obviously the remedy of the Appellants, if at all, in relation to their any service dispute was against the said Society being their employer but not against the FCI; Third, the FCI was able to prove with the aid of evidence that the Appellants were in the employment of the said Society whereas the Appellants were not able to prove with the aid of any documents that they were appointed by the FCI and how and on what basis they claimed to be in the employment of the FCI except to make an averment in the writ petitions in that behalf. It was, in our opinion, not sufficient to grant any relief to the Appellants.”

6. In furtherance of the settled position of the law regarding the negative scope of regularization of contractu