Allahabad High Court
Bandana Singh vs Union Of India And 5 Others on 28 August, 2025
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
Neutral Citation No. - 2025:AHC:151790-DB
HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT ALLAHABAD
WRIT - A No. - 2539 of 2025
Bandana Singh
.....Petitioner(s)
Versus
Union of India and 5 others
.....Respondent(s)
Counsel for Petitioner(s)
:
Kamal Kumar Singh
Counsel for Respondent(s)
:
S.P. Singh, A.S.G.I., Manjari Singh
Chief Justice's Court
HON'BLE ARUN BHANSALI, CHIEF JUSTICE
HON'BLE KSHITIJ SHAILENDRA, J.
1. Heard Shri Kamal Kumar Singh, learned counsel for the petitioner and Shri S.P. Singh, learned A.S.G.I, assisted by Ms. Manjari Singh, learned counsel for the respondents.
2. This petition has been filed challenging the order dated 25.11.2024, whereby the Central Administrative Tribunal, Allahabad Bench, Allahabad (in short ?the Tribunal?) has dismissed the Original Application No. 21 of 2020 (in short ?O.A.?) filed by the petitioner. The said O.A. was filed with a prayer to quash the order dated 29.11.2019 passed by the Chief Postmaster General, U.P. Circle, Lucknow, whereby he had rejected the petitioner?s claim for compassionate appointment.
3. Brief facts of the case are that, on 29.02.2016, the petitioner?s mother Smt. Gayatri Singh died in harness while working on the post of Gramin Dak Sewak (in short ?GDS?). The petitioner, being married daughter of the deceased, moved an application dated 10.05.2016 before the Department seeking compassionate appointment. The application was rejected by the Authority vide order dated 13.04.2017.
4. Being aggrieved of rejection, the petitioner filed O.A. No. 1035 of 2017 before the Tribunal. The said application was, after exchange of counter and rejoinder affidavits, allowed by the Tribunal on 30.08.2019 and the matter was remanded to the Department to consider the petitioner?s case afresh keeping in mind the criteria laid down and taking into consideration the chart of merit points contained in the rejoinder affidavit filed by the petitioner before the Tribunal.
5. After remand, the petitioner?s claim was again rejected by the Authority by order dated 30.08.2019 against which order the petitioner filed O.A. No. 21 of 2020, which has been dismissed by the Tribunal by the order impugned dated 25.11.2024 on the ground that the petitioner being a married daughter of the deceased, was required to prove her dependency on the deceased employee at the time of her mother?s death but no evidence had been led to establish such dependency. It has further been observed in the order impugned that the financial condition of the family, as reflected in the benefits amounting to Rs. 3,56,710/- received by the family, does not indicate financial destitution and 17 merit points allocated to the petitioner being significantly below the required threshold of 36 points, there was no merit in the claim. The Tribunal has further observed that the mother of the petitioner died in the year 2015 and since then more than eight years have passed during which period the petitioner and her daughter have been maintaining themselves and have survived as dependents on the petitioner?s husband. The Tribunal also discussed the precedents on compassionate appointment as well as its objective and upheld the order impugned before it.
6. Learned counsel for the petitioner made submissions that as per the policy of the Department contained in the notification dated 17.12.2015, the petitioner should have been allocated 37 merit points, whereas the Department has allocated only 17 merit points by ignoring the criteria laid down in the said notification. Submission is that the deceased has left three dependents, i.e. the petitioner, her father and her daughter and when the merit points are computed, the total would come to 37 points and, therefore, despite directions of the Tribunal in the earlier round of litigation that the decision has to be taken as per the chart contained in the rejoinder affidavit filed by the petitioner in the earlier O.A., the Department has not only violated the same but also has not given thoughtful consideration to the merit points. It is further urged that the petitioner?s claim could not be denied merely because she is a married daughter of the deceased and, therefore, rejection is contrary to the law laid down by this Court in Smt. Vimla Srivastava Vs. State of U.P. and others (Writ-C No. 60881 of 2015), decided on 04.12.2015, which has recently been relied upon by another Coordinate Bench of this Court in its judgment dated 12.08.2025 passed in Special Appeal Defective No. 540 of 2025 (Chanda Devi Vs. State of U.P. and another).
7. Per contra, learned A.S.G.I. submits that rejection of petitioner?s claim is not on the ground of her being married daughter of the deceased, rather the Department as well as the Tribunal have decided the matter strictly as per the criteria laid down in the notification dated 17.12.2015. It is further submitted that the revised scheme for compassionate appointment itself provides that a married daughter would be eligible for compassionate appointment but she must establish that she was wholly dependent on GDS on the date of his/her death. Further submission has been made that the petitioner had been married to one Vikas Singh about whose income no evidence was produced and as far as the alleged dependency of the petitioner?s father, namely, Shri Rajendra Bahadur Singh, is concerned, he is employed as a Teacher and was not dependent on the deceased. As regards merit points, submission is that the petitioner wrongly mentioned the number of dependents of the deceased and wrongly included even her own minor daughter, namely, Km. Aratrika, and computed 15 points for her, although the scheme is meant for the dependents of the deceased and not the dependents of the applicant seeking compassionate appointment.
8. We have considered the submissions made before us and perused the material available on record and we find that the petitioner?s claim has not been rejected on the ground that a married daughter is not entitled to get compassionate appointment and, therefore, argument advanced as well as judgments cited on that line on behalf of the petitioner, is thoroughly misplaced. The reason is that the revised scheme for compassionate engagement of an eligible dependent of deceased GDS itself prescribes eligibility of a married daughter but subject to condition that she is wholly dependent on the GDS at the time of his/her death. Relevant clauses of the Scheme are quoted as under: ?2. To Whom applicable ?? Note 1 ?Dependent Family Member? means the following: ??.
(e) Married/widowed daughter/divorced daughter wholly dependent on the GDS at the time of his/her death; or
??.?
(emphasis supplied)
9. On merit points, we find that the Department has allocated 17 merit points to the petitioner after counting the number of dependents of the deceased as two. The tabulated determination made by the Department, as indicated in the order dated 29.11.2019 impugned before the Tribunal, is reproduced as under :
Sl. No.
Liabilities / Assets of deceased GDS on which merit point were allocated
Merit Points allocated
Total dependent - 2
10 points
Left over service ? 4Y 7M 10 D
02 points
Total Discharge Benefits ? Rs. 1,56,737/-
05 points
Total
17 points
10. The petitioner has challenged the above computation made by the Department and reference has been made to paragraph no. 15 of the rejoinder affidavit filed before the Tribunal, which contains a tabulated depiction of the marks self computed by the petitioner. For a ready reference, the computation made by the petitioner is reproduced as under:
Sl. No.
Slab for GDS dependents
Merit Points marks to be allocated
1(i).
For 03 dependents
15 points
2(i).
For education of one dependent child
15 points
3(v)
For left our service upto five years till date of death
2 points
6(iii)
For discharge benefits Rs.150000/- and above
5 points
Total
37 points
11. A perusal of the aforesaid table would reveal that the petitioner has indicated three dependents of the deceased and from the pleadings contained in 7th paragraph of the writ petition, it is reflected that the said three dependents are (1) petitioner (2) her father and (3) her minor daughter. It, therefore, follows that the petitioner computed 15 points for three dependents, whereas the Department has allocated 10 points for two dependents. The finding recorded in the order passed by the Department is that from the Parivar Register, there are only two dependents and Km. Aratrika, who is daughter of the petitioner, cannot be treated as dependent and, therefore, zero merit points were allocated against the outstanding liability for education of the dependent children.
12. We notice that except the number of dependents and the points meant for education of one dependent child, there is no other difference between the computations made by the Department and the petitioner. The petitioner has made computations by including her minor daughter Km. Aratrika in the category of dependent and allocated five points to her in that column and also 15 points for her education.
13. The aforesaid computation made by the petitioner is thoroughly misplaced, inasmuch as the notification dated 17.12.2015 itself provides that the word ?dependents? has been used for 'dependents of deceased GDS' and not the 'dependents of the applicant' seeking compassionate appointment. Therefore, whatever computations have been made by the petitioner in relation to Km. Aratrika, are not acceptable. In this view of the matter, 37 points allocated by the petitioner to herself would not be available to her and even if, by any stretch of imagination, we include petitioner?s husband also as dependent of the deceased (as the petitioner has claimed her husband to be unemployed though has not treated as dependent on the deceased in the writ petition) even then, the petitioner would get 15 + 2 + 5 = 22 merit points, which are much below than 36 points which is the cut off applied by the Department. There is no dispute about the fact that no candidate obtaining less than 36 points was recommended by the Department and such a finding recorded in the order dated 29.11.2019 has not been challenged either before the Tribunal or before us. It, therefore, follows that the petitioner was rightly allocated 17 points by the Department and even if calculation is carried to 22, the petitioner would have no case for compassionate appointment.
14. In view of the above discussion, we do not find any error in the view taken by the Department or in the order passed by the Tribunal. Consequently, the writ petition has no force and the same is, accordingly, dismissed.
(Kshitij Shailendra,J.) (Arun Bhansali,CJ.)
August 28, 2025
AKShukla/-
