CCS Rules | Temporary Status Casual Labourer Entitled To Pension Even Without Formal Regularisation : Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Monday (June 1) delivered a significant ruling in favour of long-serving casual workers, holding that employees who have performed work of a permanent and continuous nature for the government over extended periods are entitled to pensionary benefits even in the absence of formal regularisation. The Court held that such casual workers are entitled to benefits equivalent to temporary government servants under the Central Civil Services (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965, and cannot be denied pension merely because their services were never formally regularised.

The Court held that though the casual workers do not attain the 'status' of a temporary government servant upon performing similar nature of works for extended years, they would be entitled to the same service benefits, received by the temporary government employee, by virtue of CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965 read with the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972.

“A temporary status casual labourer would be entitled to pensionary benefits on superannuation even in the absence of regularisation.”, observed a bench of Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Augustine George Masih.

The case arose from claims made by one Bhikhani Devi, widow of late Suraj Sah, along with Bahuru Sahu and Pitamber Jha, who had worked as casual labourers and night guards in the Department of Posts for several decades. Although they were granted temporary status under the Casual Labourers (Grant of Temporary Status and Regularisation) Scheme, 1991, their requests for pension were rejected on the ground that they had never been formally regularised as Group-D employees.

Setting aside the Patna High Court's judgments, the judgment authored by Justice Karol rejected the Union government's stand, holding that upon completion of the qualifying period of service under the scheme, the Appellants-employees are entitled to pensionary benefits irrespective of whether a formal order of regularisation had been issued.

The Court noted that since the Appellants had rendered uninterrupted service for decades, after the grant of temporary status and extension of Group-D benefits, the nature of their employment substantially changed and could not continue to be viewed through the narrow lens of their original casual engagement.

“Although, it may be correct to say that conferment of temporary status on a casual labourer under the Scheme does not ipso facto transform such employee into a temporary Government servant, however, what falls short from the aforesaid submission is that while the status of such employee continues unchanged i.e., of a 'temporary status casual labourers', the Scheme consciously and specifically extends to such employees benefits admissible to temporary Group 'D' employees upon completion of three years of continuous service under temporary status. The service conditions, at this juncture, of the casual temporary status employee under the Scheme gets substantially changed and carries all the benefits that are available to temporary government employees. Therefore, while the nomenclature and category of their service status remain unchanged, the nature and extent of benefits now available to them stand significantly enlarged and aligned with those admissible to temporary Government employees, blurring the distinction between both categories as far as benefits available to them are concerned. The distinction that remains is one relating to nomenclature, formal status and mode of regularisation but not to the nature of extended benefits.”, the court observed.

In essence, the Court held that when the Appellants became eligible to claim the same service benefits received by the Government's Group-D employees, then it would be unjustified to deny the same to the Appellants.

For the Appellants, the Court found them to become entitled to benefits under Rule 10(1-B) of the CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965 read with the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972. Thereby making them entitled to the grant of superannuation pension and other retirement benefits as admissible under the above rules.

Accordingly, the appeal was allowed, and the Supreme Court restored the CAT's orders and directed the Union Government to compute and release pensionary and consequential retiral benefits within three months.

Cause Title: BHIKHANI DEVI AND ETC. VERSUS UNION OF INDIA AND OTHERS

Citation : 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 582

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Appearance:

For Petitioner(s) :Mr. Akhilesh Kumar Pandey, AOR Mr. Amrish Kumar, AOR Mr. Sudarshan Lamba, AOR

For Respondent(s) :Mr. Sudarshan Lamba, AOR Mr. Kumar Murlidhar, AOR Mr. Atul Verma, Adv. Mr. Akhilesh Kumar Pandey, AOR Mr. Sunil Kumar Verma, Adv. Mr. Shariq Ahmed,Adv. Mr. Tariq Ahmed, Adv. M/S. Ahmadi Law Offices, AOR Mr. Bijender Chahar, A.S.G. Mr. Mohan Prasad Gupta, Adv. Mr. Rohit Khare, Adv. Ms. Vimla Sinha, Adv. Ms. Seema Bengani, Adv. Mr. Rajesh Kr.singh, Adv. Mr. Jagdish Chandra, Adv. Mr. Mohan Prasad Gupta, Adv. Mr. Sushil Raaja, Adv. Mr. Amrish Kumar, AOR