Lekh Ram Vs the State of Hp and Others — Himachal Pradesh HC (2026) — LawSathi Research

Lekh Ram Vs the State of Hp and Others — Himachal Pradesh HC (2026) — LawSathi Research

What the court decided

AI extract

Outcome

Dismissed

Issue for consideration

Whether the appellant's entire length of service from 1st March, 1988, including the period spent as a part-time Water Carrier (two and a half hours daily), could be counted towards qualifying/pensionary and retiral benefits. +1 more

Court's answer

A benefit sought by an employee must be founded upon a rule, notification or instructions providing for such benefit; in the absence of any such rule, notification or instructions enabling counting of the part-time period for pensionary benefits, the learned Single Judge was well justified in dismissing the Original Application/Civil Writ Petition, the claim resting solely on Jeet Ram's case without statutory support.

Ratio / Principle

The appellant is a fence-sitter liable to be denied consideration as per the law laid down by the Apex Court in Arvind Kumar Srivastava; he had every right to raise the claim when regularised in 1998, and having failed to do so, was not entitled to raise it after retirement merely on the basis of the 28.09.2011 judgment.

Key takeaways

The State's order dated 24.02.2014 validly recorded that the benefit of counting half of the service paid from contingencies, rendered by the appellant as a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee, had already been granted to him.ratio¶33
The Division Bench judgment in Leela Devi only ensured that a part-time worker with ten years' service be granted the status of a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee and thereafter regular appointment; it never granted relief treating the part-time period as regular for counting the entire period of service towards pensionary benefits.ratio¶28

Detailed headnote1 paragraphs

LPA dismissed — Pensionary/retiral benefits — Counting of part-time service — Appellant appointed part-time Water Carrier (two and a half hours daily) vide order dated 19.12.1987, joined 01.03.1988, converted to Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee on 05.07.1997, regularised as Class-IV employee (Peon-cum-Chowkidar) on 17.01.1998, retired 31.03.2011 — Claim to count entire service from 01.03.1988 towards pensionary benefits declined by learned Single Judge in CWPOA No. 669 of 2020, decided 11.05.2026 — Held: (i) a benefit must be founded upon a rule, notification or instructions; the Original Application was bereft of any provision or rule, the claim resting solely on Jeet Ram (CWP No. 5444 of 2010, decided 28.09.2011), wherein neither any rule nor statutory provision was referred to, and which was duly distinguished as inapplicable; (ii) Leela Devi (CWP No. 3310 of 2011, decided 12.12.2011) granted only status enhancement to Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee and regular appointment, not counting of the part-time period for pensionary benefits; (iii) under Article 368 of the CSR (Rule 14), half of the service paid from contingencies as Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee had already been counted vide State order dated 24.02.2014, which was never challenged; (iv) appellant, having not challenged his 1998 regularisation and waking up after retirement, was a fence-sitter liable to be denied consideration per State of U.P. v. Arvind Kumar Srivastava, (2015) 1 SCC 347 — Appeal dismissed as devoid of merit; pending miscellaneous applications disposed of.

( 2026:HHC:29284 )

IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA

LPA No.408 of 2026 Decided on : _15.07.2026

Lekh Ram

... Appellant

Versus

State of H.P. and others

…Respondents.

Coram

Hon’ble Mr. Gurmeet Singh Sandhawalia, Chief Justice. Hon’ble Mr. Justice Bipin Chander Negi, Judge.

Whether approved for reporting?¹

For the appellant : For the respondents :

Dr. Lalit Kumar Sharma, Advocate. Mr. Gobind Korla, Additional Advocate General, for the respondents/State.

G.S. Sandhawalia, Chief Justice (Oral)

Consideration has been sought of the judgment of

the learned Single Judge in CWPOA No. 669 of 2020, titled Lekh Ram vs. State of H.P. and others, dated

11.05.2026 .

The learned Single Judge had dismissed the said case, whereby the claim of the appellant for counting the entire length of service from 1^st March, 1988 towards his pensionary benefits, i.e. the period spent on a part-time basis, for qualifying service, was declined.

Resultantly, it has held that the impugned order

dated 23^rd January, 2017 passed in OA No.1344 of 2017

1 Whether the reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the Judgment? Yes

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passed was the second order passed in the matter, and an earlier dated 24.02.2014 had never been challenged, therefore, the relief could not be granted. The learned Single Judge, upon detailed consideration had come to the conclusion that the service rendered as a part-time Water Carrier for two and a half hours could not be counted for the purpose of pensionary and other retiral benefits.

The judgment relied upon in Civil Writ Petition

No. 5444 of 2010, titled Jeet Ram vs. State of H.P. and others, decided on 28.09.2011 , was duly distinguished and held to be inapplicable to the facts of the present case. Reliance was also placed upon the judgment of the Division Bench in Civil Writ Petition No. 3310 of 2011, titled

Leela Devi vs. State of H.P. and others, decided on 12.12.2011 along with connected matters , wherein certain directions were issued that the status of a part-time worker, who had completed ten years of service, was required to be enhanced to that of a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee and thereafter such employee was liable to be appointed on regular basis. It was thus noticed that the benefit was only to ensure that the part-time worker was granted the status of a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee and thereafter was liable to be appointed on

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regular basis. The said judgment never, as such, granted any other relief that the status of the part-time worker was also to be treated as regular for the purpose of counting the entire period of service towards pensionary benefits.

The factual matrix is that the appellant was appointed to the post of Water Carrier vide appointment order dated 19.12.1987 and thereafter he had joined on 1^st March, 1988. His services were converted to a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee on 05.07.1997 and thereafter, on 17.01.1998, he was appointed as a regular Class-IV employee (Peon-cum-Chowkidar). He had retired from service on 31.03.2011.

Apparently, on account of the decision in Jeet Ram's case dated 28^th September, 2011 (Supra) wherein certain benefits had been granted by counting the part-time service for all intents and purposes after the employee became a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee and thereafter a Regular Employee, he had filed Civil Writ Petition No. 4741 of 2013 (page 65 of the paper book) for grant of the same benefit. The said writ petition was disposed of on 11^th July, 2013 with a direction to consider his case. The dispute, as such, thereafter had cropped up, though the petitioner, before that time had been regularized on 17^th

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January, 1998, but during the course of his employment he had never sought for the said benefit or challenged the terms of his regularisation.

Thus, he can safely be termed as a fence-sitter and is liable to be denied consideration, keeping in view the law laid down, by the Apex Court in State of Uttar Pradesh and others vs. Arvind Kumar Srivastava and others, (2015) 1 SCC 347 . However, the State, vide order dated 24^th February, 2014 (Annexure A-5) after examining his case, had come to the valid conclusion that the benefit of counting half of the service paid from the contingency during the service rendered by him as a Whole Time Contingent Paid Employee had already been granted to him. The relevant portion reads as under:-

“ Counting half of Service paid from Contingencies with regular service:

Under Article 368 of the CSR (Rule 14). periods of service paid from contingencies do not count as qualifying service for pension. In some cases, employees paid from contingencies are employed in types of work requiring services of whole-time workers and are paid on monthly rates of pay or daily rated computed and paid on monthly basis and on being found fit brought on to regular establishment. The question whether in such case service paid front contingencies should be allowed to count for pension and if so, to what extent has been considered in the national Council and in pursuance of the recommendation of the council. it has been decided that hall the service paid from coming contingencies will be allowed to count towards pension at the time of absorption in the regular

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employee subject to the following conditions, viz.:-

(a) Service paid from contingencies should have been in a job involving whole-time employee (and not part-time for a portion of the day).

(b) Service paid from contingencies should be in a type of work or job for which regular posts could have been sanctioned, e.g. Malies. Chowkidars. Khalasis, etc.

(c) The service should have been one for which the payment is made either on monthly or daily rates computed and paid on a monthly basis and which though not analogue to the regular scale of pay should hear some relation in the matter of pay to those being paid for similar jobs being performed by staffs in regular establishment.

(d) The service paid from contingencies should have been continuous and followed by absorption in regular employment without a break.

(e) Subject to the above conditions being fulfilled, the weightage for past service paid from contingencies will be limited to the period after 1^st January 1961, for which authentic record of service may be available.

Accordingly, the benefit of counting half of the service paid from contingencies with regular service, rendered by the petitioner as Whole Time Contingent Paid employee has already been given to him.

The petitioner did not challenge the said

decision but chose only to serve a legal notice on 18^th October, 2016 relying upon the order dated 11^th July, 2013, whereby his case was directed to be considered. The respondent was thus forced to pass a fresh order on 23^rd January, 2017, (Annexure A-18) rejecting his claim and distinguishing the case of Jeet Ram (Supra) ,

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which led to the filing of OA No. 1344 of 2017 (Annexure A-

before the erstwhile H.P. State Administrative Tribunal, without raising any challenge to the earlier order dated 24^th February, 2014.

It is pertinent to notice that the Original Application is totally bereft of any provision or rule on the basis of which the claim could be made for grant of the benefit of the period of almost ten years spent as a PartTime Worker for the purpose of pensionary benefits, and the entire case was founded only on the basis of the decision in Jeet Ram’s case (supra) . The respondents, in their reply, had specifically objected that the petitioner had worked only for two and a half hours, which was subsequently extended to four hours as per the State instructions, and relied upon Article 368 of the CSRs (Rule 14), already reproduced above. In such circumstances, the learned Single Judge had come to the conclusion that the benefit of the said period for the purpose of qualifying service could not be accepted.

On going through the judgment in Jeet Ram's case, it is apparent that neither any rule nor statutory provision was referred to for granting the benefit for all intents and purposes, and even the seniority in the Part-Time Workers' list was to be reckoned from 1^st October, 1990.

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It is a settled principle that when an employee

seeks any benefit, the same has to be founded upon a rule, notification or instructions providing for such benefit. In the absence of any such rule, notification or instructions enabling the counting of the said period for pensionary benefits, the learned Single Judge was well justified in dismissing the Original Application/Civil Writ Petition. The claim is solely based upon the judgment in Jeet Ram’s case and is not further supported by any statutory rule. It is also to be noticed that the manner in which the petitioner raised the claim after his retirement is not liable to be appreciated against him, inasmuch as he had every right to raise such a claim at the time when he was granted the benefit of regularization in 1998. Having failed to do so, he was not entitled to raise such a claim merely on the basis of the judgment rendered on 28^th September, 2011, after his retirement. The relevant part of judgment in Arvind Kumar

Srivastava’s case reads as under:-

“ 22.1 Normal rule is that when a particular set of employees is given relief by the Court, all other identically situated persons need to be treated alike by extending that benefit. Not doing so would amount to discrimination and would be violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. This principle needs to be applied in service matters more emphatically as the service jurisprudence evolved by this Court from time to time postulates that all similarly situated persons should be treated similarly. Therefore, the normal rule would be that merely because other similarly situated persons did

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not approach the Court earlier, they are not to be treated differently.

22.2 However, this principle is subject to well recognized exceptions in the form of laches and delays as well as acquiescence. Those persons who did not challenge the wrongful action in their cases and acquiesced into the same and woke up after long delay only because of the reason that their counterparts who had approached the Court earlier in time succeeded in their efforts, then such employees cannot claim that the benefit of the judgment rendered in the case of similarly situated persons be extended to them. They would be treated as fence sitters and laches and delays, and/or the acquiescence, would be a valid ground to dismiss their claim.”

In such circumstances, we do not find any plausible reason to interfere with the well-reasoned

judgment passed by the learned Single Judge. Consequently, the present appeal, being devoid of any merit, is dismissed. Pending miscellaneous application(s), if any, shall also stand disposed of.

(G.S. Sandhawalia) Chief Justice

(Bipin Chander Negi) Judge

15^th July, 2026 Tarun Singh