The bench of Justice Bipin Gupta was dealing with a case where the petitioner had accepted compassionate appointment to the post in 2013 on which he also worked for 2 years, before filing the present petition in 2015 seeking appointment at a higher post.

It was the case of the petitioner that initially he had applied for the post of Assistant Traffic Inspector. However, while his application was pending, certain amendments were brought to the relevant rules, and the desired post was made unavailable for compassionate appointment.

Hence, he was offered the post of a conductor, which he accepted. Subsequently, the relevant rules were again amended that made the desired post eligible to be granted under compassionate appointment. In this light, the petitioner filed the petition in 2015 seeking appointment at the higher post.

It was argued that the rules that were in force at the time of the death of his father were required to be applied to his application as per which the desired post was available, and the subsequent rules, that got amended, could not have been applied.

On the contrary, the State argued that no one could claim compassionate appointment to a particular post, as a matter of right, since compassionate appointment was not an alternative mode of recruitment.

Further, it was submitted that the petition was filed after a delay of 2 years, and once the petitioner had accepted the post without any objection, he could not seek appointment to a higher post later.

After hearing the contentions, the Court observed that compassionate appointment did not confer vested right to public employment, neither did the death of an employee entitle his dependent to appointment to a desired post. Further, mere eligibility or possession of a particular educational qualification did not confer a right upon the dependent for a particular or higher post.

The Court further highlighted that the petitioner had the opportunity to challenge the action of the respondent immediately upon receiving letter of appointment, or to accept the offer while reserving the right to claim consideration for higher post. However, nothing was done, rather the post was accepted.

The Court made a reference to the Supreme Court case of Director of Town Panchayat & Ors. v. M. Jayabal & Anr. in which it was held that, “once a person has accepted a lower post offered to him on compassionate grounds, he cannot subsequently claim appointment to a higher post”.

In this light, the Court opined, “it cannot be disputed that the relevant date for consideration of a claim for compassionate appointment depends upon the applicable rules and the law governing such appointment on date of death. However, in the present case, once the petitioner accepted the lower post offered to him without any demur and continued to work thereon for almost two years, he could not subsequently claim appointment to a higher post”.

Accordingly, the petition was dismissed.