“Nothing But Exploitation”: Andhra Pradesh High Court Flags Long-Term Engagement Of Temporary Workers Without Regularisation

The Andhra Pradesh High Court has strongly deprecated the State's long-standing practice of engaging workers on ad-hoc basis for decades, extracting work equivalent to that of full-time employees, while paying them meagre wages and refusing regularisation and benefits arising out of it.The criticism was propounded by a Division Bench comprising Justice Battu Devanand and Subhendu Samanta while dealing with a batch of petitions filed by workers employed in various government departments under the Telugu Ganga Project and related divisions, challenging an order of the Andhra Pradesh Administrative Tribunal, whereby their plea of regularisation was rejected.Initially, the workers, engaged between 1987 and 1989 as Nominal Muster Roll workers, typists, and other non-regular staff, continued serving for decades while performing duties of a regular and perennial nature. Overtime, they were granted minimum time-scale pay with dearness allowance, but were not formally regularised into permanent service, and were denied regularisation on the grounds that they had not completed five years of service prescribed under relevant government orders and legislation. While seeking regularisation, they argued that they had rendered continuous long-term service for decades and were engaged in essential routine work. When the Tribunal rejected their plea, they approached the High Court, where the Division Bench remarked,“In several cases, this Court is noticing that in various departments of the State Government without filling the sanctioned vacancies by following regular selection procedure, engaging the educated and qualified persons on adhoc/outsourcing/contract basis by paying meagre remuneration/wages and they are utilizing their services for more than one or two decades. Whenever they sought to regularize their services, the respondents departments are starting raising grounds against them contending that their appointments are not made by following the procedure and they are not appointed against the sanctioned posts. “Noting that such a practice is “unfair and opposed to good conscience”, the Bench added, “These petitioners have accepted such unfair treatment only with a hope that at some point of time their claim for regularization could be considered. Therefore, the petitioners cannot be allowed to languish as daily rated employees for indefinite period and be denied of the regular benefits of the Government employees forever. Such scenario does not show the welfare State in good light. Whenever a class of employees like the petitioners herein face unfair situation of being employed on a daily rate basis, denied of all benefits as that of regular employees, but discharging regular duties, such situation would only rob the State of its constitutional obligation to be reasonable to its citizens and provide adequate livelihood to support the sustenance of these petitioners, in furtherance of Article 21 of the Constitution of India. After all, any policy of the State has to be measured in terms of how the policies treat the weaker sections of the society. When these petitioners are allowed to be exploited by the authorities by paying them some pittance as daily wages and work has been extracted as that of regular employees, the least the State could do in such situation is to consider the claim for regularization at some point of time. Their cry for regularization cannot be hanging fire, without any positive action in sight at the hands of the State. The idea of welfare State is realized only when the citizens are treated fairly, equally and without any exploitation.”The Court went on to note that the action of the State in utilising the services of the petitioners for decades against meagre remuneration constitutes “nothing but exploitation.” The Court stated that, “... after passing all these long period, those persons who are engaged on adhoc/outsourcing/contract basis, may not be in a position to attend for regular selection process due to age bar. The Government being the model employer has to keep all these aspects in their mind, when they are rejecting the request of the petitioners for regularization even after utilizing their services for essential and perennial duties. The present cases are a classic example for illegal and arbitrary actions of the employers.”Consequently, the Bench allowed the petitions and directed the respondents to regularise the services of the petitioners along with consequential benefits.Case Details:Case Number: WRIT PETITION Nos.44902, 31806 & 45705 of 2018Case Title: K. Narayana Reddy v. The State of Andhra Pradesh and OrsClick Here To Read/Download Order

“Nothing But Exploitation”: Andhra Pradesh High Court Flags Long-Term Engagement Of Temporary Workers Without Regularisation

Saahas Arora

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