New Delhi: The Supreme Court has set aside Kerala High Court judgments directing Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited to consider the promotion of a group of Hindi Translators to the post of Rajbhasha Adhikari under recruitment rules that predated the 2005 Rules, holding that officials working only on an officiating basis acquire no vested right to promotion under superseded rules.
Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra, delivering the judgment for a Bench also comprising Justice Ujjal Bhuyan, was hearing appeals by BSNL against common judgments of the Kerala High Court which had affirmed a Single Judge's order directing the Corporation to consider the private respondents, who were officiating as Assistant Director (Official Language) later renamed 'Rajbhasha Adhikari' for promotion without reference to the written test prescribed under the Rajbhasha Adhikari Recruitment Rules, 2005, and instead on the basis of rights said to have accrued under the rules in force before 2005.
The respondents, appointed as Hindi Translators in various grades, had been promised automatic promotion to the post of Hindi Officer under a 1994 administrative circular, and later stood to benefit from the Assistant Director (Official Language) Recruitment Rules, 2002, which required all 120 existing vacancies to be filled by promoting eligible Hindi Translators. Neither benefit ever materialised, and the 2002 Rules were never brought into force. The subsequent 2005 Rules renamed the post 'Rajbhasha Adhikari' and required candidates to clear a written test for promotion, with any shortfall in eligible candidates to be met by direct recruitment these were the rules under challenge before the High Court.
The central question, as the Court framed it, was whether the respondents' case was governed by its earlier decision in CMD/Chairman, BSNL v. Mishri Lal, which had denied relief to similarly placed officiating Hindi Officers, or by the later three-judge decision in Medini C. v. BSNL, which had distinguished Mishri Lal and ruled in favour of employees who had been provisionally promoted and regularised under the 2002 Rules before the 2005 Rules came into force.
Examining the undisputed fact, recorded even in BSNL's own counter-affidavit, that the respondents had never been promoted to Rajbhasha Adhikari on a regular or even ad hoc basis but remained purely officiating, the Court held that this brought the case squarely within Mishri Lal rather than Medini C., since the distinguishing feature in the latter case provisional promotion and regularisation under the 2002 Rules before their supersession was entirely absent here.
The Court further relied on its decision in State of Himachal Pradesh v. Raj Kumar, which had overturned the earlier rule in Y.V. Rangaiah v. J. Sreenivasa Rao that vacancies must be filled under the rules in force when they arose. The Court reiterated that "a candidate has a right to be considered in the light of the existing rules and that such right occurs on the date of consideration of the eligible candidates under the rules existing at that point in time," and that the government may validly decide, through a fair and reasonable policy consistent with Article 14, not to fill vacancies under repealed rules, without any employee acquiring a vested right to be considered under those repealed rules.
Applying this ratio, the Court held that the High Court could not have directed consideration of the respondents' promotion under the rules existing before the 2005 Rules. The common impugned judgments were accordingly set aside, the appeals were allowed, and pending applications were disposed of.
Appearances:
For the Appellants: Mr. Piyush Sharma, Advocate.
For Respondent No.5/Department of Telecommunications: Ms. Archana Pathak Dave, Additional Solicitor General.
For the Private Respondents: Mr. G. Arudhra Rao, Advocate.
Case Title: The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited and Another vs. G.N. Mani Ravinder and Others, Civil Appeal Nos.12966-12967 of 2026, 2026 INSC 1007
