Right to Regularisation Does Not End with Employee’s Death: High Court

The right of an employee to be considered for regularisation does not automatically lapse upon his or her death, and such a claim may continue to have financial implications for the legal heirs, the Lucknow Bench of the High Court has observed in an important service matter.

 

The court issued the direction while considering the case of a daily-wage employee who had served in the Rural Engineering Department for more than 18 years. It held that the employee should be treated as regularised from the date on which he became eligible for regular appointment. The court further clarified that the right to consideration for regularisation survives even after the death of an employee because the outcome may affect monetary benefits payable to the employee’s legal heirs.

 

A single bench of Justice Indrajeet Shukla also directed the authorities to examine the claim of the deceased employee’s son, Hasan Ahmad, for appointment on compassionate grounds. The matter is to be considered under the Uttar Pradesh Recruitment of Dependants of Government Servants Dying in Harness Rules, 1974, in accordance with the applicable legal provisions.

 

According to the case record, the employee’s father, Rifaquat Hussain, was appointed as a Junior Assistant on a work-charge establishment in the Rural Engineering Department on November 1, 1985. He died on August 11, 2012, after completing more than 18 years of service.

 

His name had been placed at serial number 58 on a seniority list prepared in 2005 for regularisation. In 2012, 172 Group-C posts were sanctioned for the regularisation of employees associated with daily-wage, work-charge and court-related service matters. However, Hussain died before the regularisation process could be completed, while several other similarly placed employees were subsequently regularised.