1. The petitioners in this group of petitions except the petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987, who were employed temporarily for specified period or periods as contingent work-charged unskilled labourers by the Oil and Natural Gas Commission ('Commission' for short), have filed these petitions praying that the Commission be directed to desist from terminating their services on expiry of their period of employment. Petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987 was employed as contingent work-charged labourer for a specified period.

2. The petitioners except the petitioners in Special Civil Application Nos. 227, 282, 383, 1305 and 3549 of 1987 were employed as contingent work-charged unskilled labourers for specified period of 90 days. In other words, each of these petitioners was employed for a period of 90 days. So far as petitioner No. 1 in Special Civil Application No. 227 of 1987 is concerned, his contention is that besides his employment for a period of 90 days from November 1, 1986 to January 29, 1987, he was employed for three months by the Commission in 1981 also. Petitioner No. 2 in the said Special Civil Application No. 227 of 1987 claims that besides his employment for 90 days from November 4, 1986 to February 2, 1987, he was employed by the Commission for 26 days in 1985 and 13 days in 1986. Petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 383 of 1987 claims that he was employed for 90 days from July 19, 1985 to October 10, 1985, and again from November 17, 1986 to February 14, 1987. It would, therefore, appear that each time he was employed for 90 days. Petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987 was last employed by the Commission for 90 days from January 7 to April 6, 1987. He, however, claims that prior to his last employment he was also employed for one year in 1974-75, 60 days in 1981 and 89 days in 1986. This petitioner was employed as contingent work-charged labourer and his claim is that he was employed as a driver. Petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 3549 of 1987 was employed for 90 days in 1984, 60 days in 1985, 90 days in 1986 and for 90 days from April 24 to June 1, 1987. However, his last employment came to be terminated after completion of 38 days. It may be stated here that so far as petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987 is concerned, it is admitted that he was employed from January 7 to April 6, 1987. The Commission, however, denies other allegations made by this petitioner as regards his employment in 1973-74, 1981 and 1986. One thing which clearly emerges is that each of the petitioners whenever he was employed, was employed for a specified period.

3. Petitioners contend that there are several regular vacancies in the posts in which contingent work-charged unskilled labourers and skilled labourers are appointed and, therefore, there was absolutely no reason or justification to employ the petitioners for specified period. It is contended that since the posts are vacant, the Commission was bound to employ them on regular basis and, therefore, their employment for only specified period is bad in law. It is submitted that the Commission should be directed not to terminate their services on expiry of the period for which they are employed and to regularise their services. It may be mentioned here that in some of the petitions, a prayer is made to quash and set aside the orders employing the petitioners for specified periods. It, however, appears that the reliefs which the petitioners in these petitions are seeking is that the orders of employing them are bad to the extent that period of employment is specified. In other words, the petitioners do not dispute the validity of their employment, but they contend that they should be treated as on regular employment ignoring the condition limiting their employment to certain period.

4. These petitions are resisted by the Commission. It is contended on behalf of the Commission that the petitioners have been engaged as contingent unskilled labourers for specified period as per the requirement of the work in the Commission. It is stated that the Commission does not require the services of the petitioners' any further and, therefore, as per the letter of employment engaging the petitioners specifically for a particular period, the petitioner's engagement had come to an end. It is further submitted that the Commission has

"such a nature of work where any time due to non-static type of jobs in many areas, unskilled labourers are required to do the job for field areas, for shift personnel and many a time even at odd hours, the people are required to be engaged for emergency which may crop up at any time"

. It is submitted that the Commission is required to engage unskilled labourers for various jobs at various work centers for temporary periods on temporary basis. It is further submitted that whenever posts are vacant and whenever there is a job requirement, the Commission invites applications either through press or from Employment Exchange or through departmental circular from the eligible candidates. The Commission invited applications for 30 posts (12 Surveyors Grade II, 12 Motor Vehicle drivers and 6 attendants Grade III) on March 5, 1987. It is submitted that the Commission has to make recruitment as provided in the Oil & Natural Gas Commission (Recruitment and Promotion) Regulations, 1980 ('Regulations' for short) which are statutory regulations. It is submitted that continuance of contingent employees on regular basis would be contrary to the provisions of the Regulations. It is, therefore, submitted that it is not open to the Commission to convert the contingent workers as regular employees.

5. It is not disputed that recruitment of employees by the Commission is regulated by the Regulations. The Commission is required to follow the procedure prescribed in the Regulations for filling up the vacancies. It is also not disputed that the petitioners are not recruited in accordance with these Regulations. They, except the petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987, are employed as contingent work-charged unskilled labourers. Petitioner in Special Civil Application No. 1305 of 1987 was, as pointed out above, employed as contingent work-charged labourer. It is thus clear that none of the petitioners is regularly recruited employee of the Commission. Each of them was employed for a specified period or periods. The question is whether by mere fact of the petitioners being employed for specified period, do they acquire any right of regular employment? The answer, obviously has to be in the negative. The Commission could not have made their employment on regular basis without following the procedure said down for recruitment in the Regulations. We do not know how the petitioners came to be employed for specified period as stated by them; but it is not disputed that they were not regularly recruited as provided in the Regulations. A person who is given a temporary employment or is given employment as contingent work-charged employee, cannot claim regular employment merely on the basis of such temporary employment. If the petitioners' contention were to be accepted, the guarantee of equality and equality of opportunity in matters of public employment enshrined in Articles 14 and 16 would be infringed. All persons, who are eligible for the posts to which the petitioners claim to be regularly employed are entitled to an equal opportunity to compete for the posts. If the petitioners' contention is accepted and their employment as contingent work-charged labourers is regularised, the persons who are eligible and who possess same qualifications and skill as the petitioners would be denied opportunity of competing for the posts. A similar question had come up for consideration before a Division Bench of this Court (to which I was a party) in Special Civil Application No. 3982 of 1984 which was disposed of on August 1, 1984. The petitioner who was appointed as part-time water server temporarily claimed that she should be absorbed in service permanently without a fresh selection to the post. The petitioner also contended that termination of her services was in violation of Section 25-F of the Industrial Disputes Act, but that contention is not relevant so far as the present petitions are concerned. Dealing with the petitioner's contention that her employment should be regularised and she should be considered to be full time regular employee, the Division Bench observed as follows:

The petitioner, as we have indicated, was appointed part-time in a full time post pending regular appointment of a person to that post. As against a regular appointee such a temporary appointee can have no grievance as regular appointment is made in accordance with settled law and procedure after giving opportunity to all those eligible to apply to seek appointment and after considering the comparative claims of such persons. That is not the case with temporary or ad hoc appointment. Therefore, by its very nature that ad hoc appointment is liable to be disturbed to give place to a regular appointee as otherwise the guarantee of equality under Article 14 of the Constitution will be infringed. The right of every person to seek employment in any office would normally stand infringed by a temporary appointment but the evident answer would be that the appointment by its very character is transitional in. nature and would not seriously harm the interest of any applicant. But if such a temporary appointee is to be regularly appointed in the usual course for the mere reason that such appointee has worked for some period in that post it would be negativing the rights of others who would have been entitled to seek to be appointed to that post and to have had their claims duly considered. That is why any course of regularisation of a temporary appointee unless there be special circumstances, would be unjustified constitutionally. Therefore, we are indicating that there are sufficient reasons why the petitioner's services could not be regularised.

6. Regular appointment in organisations like the Commission has to be made in accordance with settled law or Rules or Regulations governing such appointment and the prescribed procedure. All persons eligible to apply for such appointment or post have to be given an equal opportunity to apply or compete for the post and it is only after considering the comparative merits that selection and appointment to the post can be made. As held by the Division Bench in the aforesaid decision, a temporary or ad hoc appointee cannot make grievance against such regular appointment. If the ad hoc or temporary appointee is eligible for the post, he may apply for it and compete for the post with other eligible persons, but be cannot claim regular appointment merely because he. happened to be appointed on an ad hoc or temporary basis. If employment or appointment of temporary or ad hoc appointee is regularised, as observed above, guarantee of equality and equality of opportunity in matters of public employment enshrined in Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution would be infringed. Such regularisation would encourage back door appointments denying equality of opportunity to those who are eligible for the post held by ad hoc or temporary appointee. Therefore, even if there are vacancies as contended by the petitioners, they cannot claim that their employment should be regularised merely because they were employed temporarily for specified period. The Commission is under an obligation to make recruitment as provided in the Recruitment Rules and all persons who are eligible for the posts which are vacant must get equal opportunity for competing for the posts, for otherwise, as observed above. Articles 14 and 16 would be violated. In my opinion, therefore, petitioners' claim cannot be sustained.

7. Petitioners sought to rely on a decision of the Supreme Court in Dhirendra Chamoli v. State of U.P. , in support of their contention that their employment should be regularised. The question which came up for consideration before the Supreme Court in that case was different from the one which arises for my consideration in the present case. That was a case in which the persons who were engaged by Nehru Yuvak Kendra as casual workers on daily wages basis were doing the same work as performed by class IV employees on regular basis, but they were not given same salary and allowances which are paid to Class IV employees. These persons were engaged as casual workers for many years and as stated above were performing the same duties as Class IV employees. It was in that context that the Supreme Court observed that these employees were entitled to the same salary and conditions of service as Class IV employees regularly appointed against the sanctioned posts. The Supreme Court observed that the Government cannot avoid mandate of equality enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution. This Article, the Supreme Court held, declares that there shall be equality before law and equal protection of the law and implicit in it is the further principle that there must be equal pay for work of equal value. Therefore, the employees who were in service of the different Nehru Yuvak Kendras in the country and who are admittedly performing the same duties as Class IV employees must, therefore, get the same salary and conditions of service as Class IV employees. I fail to see how this decision can be of any assistance to the petitioners. There is no question of equal pay for equal work in these petitions. It is true that the Supreme Court did observe that it was not desirable that any management and particularly the Central Government should continue to employ persons on casual basis in organisations which have been in existence for over 12 years, and also observed

"...the posts will be sanctioned by the Central Government in the different Nehru Yuvak Kendras, so that those persons can be regularised"

. But these observations made in the context of the peculiar facts of that case do not support or advance the claim made by the petitioners. In the instant case, the petitioners were in service for short periods and not for many years as were the petitioners in the case before the Supreme Court. The Commission, as already observed above, is required to follow the procedure laid down by the Regulations for making regular appointments. There is nothing in the aforesaid judgment of the Supreme Court which indicates that even if a person is appointed casually or temporarily or as contingent work-charged labourer for a specified period of short duration, his services have to be regularised without following the procedure for recruitment laid down in statutory regulations.

8. Another case on which reliance was placed on behalf of the petitioners was the case of Ratanlal and Ors. v. State of Haryana and Ors. . That was a case in which the State Government had appointed teachers on ad hoc basis at the commencement of an academic year and terminated their services before the commencement of the next summer vacation, or earlier, to appoint them against on ad hoc basis at the commencement of next academic year and to terminate their service before the commencement of the succeeding summer vacation or earlier and to continue to do so year after year. The Supreme Court, therefore, directed the State Government to take immediate steps to fill up in accordance with the relevant rules the vacancies in which teachers appointed on an ad hoc basis were then working and to allow all those teachers who were then holding these posts on ad hoc basis to remain in those posts till the vacancies were duly filled up. The Supreme Court further directed that the. teachers who were working on such ad hoc basis if they had the prescribed qualifications may also, apply for being appointed regularly in those posts. The State Government was directed to consider sympathetically the question of relaxing the qualification of maximum age prescribed for appointment to those posts in the case of those who had been victims of the system of 'ad hoc' appointments. In the instant case, there are no ad hoc appointments made year after year. The petitioners were employed only for short period or periods. Their case is not comparable with the case of the teachers before the Supreme Court. Again, it is pertinent to note that the Supreme Court directed the State Government to take steps to fill up vacancies in accordance with the relevant rules. No direction was given to regularise ad hoc appointments of teachers as indeed such a direction could not have been given. The Commission is bounad to fill up vacancies in accordance with the Regulations and, therefore, the petitioners cannot claim regularisation of their employment. Instead of supporting the petitioners' case, the Supreme Court decision supports the view canvassed on behalf of the Commission that it can fill up vacancies only in accordance with the Regulations and that it cannot regularise the services of the petitioners as claimed by them.

9. Petitioners also sought to rely on a decision of the Supreme Court in Catering Cleaners of Southern Railway v. Union of India and Anr. (1987) 9 Reports 81. That was a case in which the provisions of the Contract Laboar (Regulation and Abolition) Act, 1970, came up for consideration of the Supreme Court in the context of a contract entered into by the Southern Railway which related to cleaning catering establishments and pantry cars. The Supreme Court held that the work of cleaning catering establishments and pantry cars was necessary and incidental to the industry or business of the Southern Railway and so requirement of Clause (a) of Section 10(2) of the said Act is satisfied; that it was of perennial nature satisfied the 'requirement of Clause (b) of the said section; that the work was done through regular workmen in most Railways in the country and thus requirement of Clause (c) of the said section was satisfied; and that the work required the employment of sufficient number of wholetime workmen satisfied requirement of Clause (d) of the said section. Thus, all the relevant factors mentioned in Section 10(2) of the said Act were satisfied. The Supreme Court, therefore, held that the petitioners were entitled to a writ of mandamus directing the Central Government to abolish the contract labour system under which cleaners in catering establishments and pantry cars were employed in the Southern Railway. The Supreme Court, however, gave direction to the Central Government as stated in the judgment. This judgment, is my opinion, is of no assistance to the petitioners. In the instant case, no question of contract labour is involved. The contention which is raised by the petitioners is that their employment for a specified period should be treated as regular employment.

10. In my opinion, none of the decisions relied upon by the petitioners is of any assistance to them. Petitioners have no right to get their employment, which was purely temporary for a specified period, regularised or treat such employment as on regular, basis. As already observed above, if the petitioners' contention were to be accepted, the persons who are similarly situated and who are eligible for appointment to the posts to which the petitioners are seeking employment, would be denied equal opportunity of competing for the posts. Further, the Commission is bound to follow the procedure laid down in the Regulations for making regular recruitment and since the procedure has not been followed in giving employment to the petitioners, as stated above, in my opinion, no relief can be granted to the petitioners and the petitions deserve to be rejected.

11. In the result, these petitions fail and are rejected. I am told that interim relief which was granted by the Court in some of the petitions has already come to an end. In other words, at present no interim relief granted in any of the petitions is in operation to-day. It, however, appears that Mr. R.M. Mehta, learned Counsel appearing for the Commission had given oral assurance to the petitioners that status quo will be maintained till the disposal of these petitions. At this stage, learned Counsel appearing for the petitioners request that status quo be ordered to be maintained for a few weeks to enable the petitioners to prefer appeal against this judgment. In my view, the petitioners have no right of regular employment as claimed by them and since interim relief granted by this Court is no longer in operation, I see no reason to grant any further relief at this stage to the petitioners. The request made by the learned Counsel is, therefore, rejected.

Rule in each of these petitions shall stand discharged with no order as to costs.