Delhi High Court
Sachin Yadav vs Union Of India And Ors on 30 July, 2025
Author: C. Hari Shankar
Bench: C. Hari Shankar
$~56
* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
+ W.P.(C) 3805/2022
SACHIN YADAV .....Petitioner
Through: Mr. R.K. Jha, Adv.
versus
UNION OF INDIA AND ORS .....Respondents
Through: Mr. Rakesh Kumar Dudeja,
SPC with Mr. Madan Lal Kalkal, Mr.
Devendra Kumar and Ms. Priti, Advs.
CORAM:
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE C. HARI SHANKAR
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE OM PRAKASH SHUKLA
ORDER (ORAL)
% 30.07.2025
C. HARI SHANKAR, J.
1. The petitioner is the son of Vijay Kumar Yadav, a
Constable/GD in the Central Industrial Security Force1, who expired
on 21 September 1988 while in harness.
2. On 7 February 2000, Shakuntala Devi, wife of Vijay Kumar
Yadav, applied to the respondents seeking compassionate
appointment. She was, however, not granted appointment as she did
not possess the requisite qualification for the post of Constable.
3. The petitioner and his mother maintained silence thereafter till
1 "CISF" hereinafter
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2018.
4. On 2 February 2018, the petitioner and his mother Shakuntala
Devi once again applied to the respondents seeking compassionate
appointment for the petitioner. Mr. R.K. Jha, learned Counsel who
appears for the petitioner, submits that the petitioner had attained
majority in 2014, but was not possessed of the requisite qualification
for the post of Constable at that time and, after acquiring the requisite
qualification, applied in 2018.
5. By communication dated 13 January 2020, the petitioner and
his mother, Shakuntala Devi were informed that the petitioner had not
been recommended for compassionate appointment.
6. It is in these circumstances that the petitioner has approached
this Court seeking a mandamus to the respondents to grant him
compassionate appointment as Constable.
7. Mr. Jha, learned Counsel for the petitioner has not drawn our
attention to any executive instruction, rule or regulation under which,
18 years after the expiry of the father of his client, his client could
have applied for compassionate appointment.
8. Compassionate appointment is intended to enable a family of a
government servant who dies in harness to tide over the immediately
indigent circumstances in which it may find itself. It is well settled
that compassionate appointment is not an alternative mode of
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recruitment. It caters to a very specific exigency, which dies with
efflux of time. Compassionate appointment cannot, therefore, be
sought long after the bread winner of a family dies. It is not a right
which continues in perpetuity till purged. The authorities who are
approached for compassionate appointment have to satisfy themselves
that, owing to the death of the main bread winner of the family, the
family has been placed in distress and is unable to fend for itself and
that there is need for immediate succour.
9. Allowing applications for compassionate appointment more
than a decade after the death of a family member would do complete
disservice to the very concept of compassionate appointment and
would convert it into an alternate mode of recruitment.
10. We may refer, in this context, to the following passages from
the judgments of the Supreme Court in Bhawani Prasad Sonkar v
UOI2 and Canara Bank v Ajithkumar G.K.3:
From Bhawani Prasad Sonkar
"15. Now, it is well settled that compassionate employment is
given solely on humanitarian grounds with the sole object to
provide immediate relief to the employee's family to tide over the
sudden financial crisis and cannot be claimed as a matter of right.
Appointment based solely on descent is inimical to our
Constitutional scheme, and ordinarily public employment must be
strictly on the basis of open invitation of applications and
comparative merit, in consonance with Articles 14 and 16 of the
Constitution of India. No other mode of appointment is
permissible. Nevertheless, the concept of compassionate
appointment has been recognized as an exception to the general
rule, carved out in the interest of justice, in certain exigencies, by
2 (2011) 4 SCC 209
3 2025 SCC OnLine SC 290
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way of a policy of an employer, which partakes the character of the
service rules. That being so, it needs little emphasis that the scheme
or the policy, as the case may be, is binding both on the employer
and the employee. Being an exception, the scheme has to be strictly
construed and confined only to the purpose it seeks to achieve."
From Canara Bank
"11. Decisions of this Court on the contours of appointment on
compassionate ground are legion and it would be apt for us to
consider certain well-settled principles, which have crystallized
through precedents into a rule of law. They are (not in sequential
but contextual order):
*****
j) An application for compassionate appointment has
to be made immediately upon death/incapacitation and in
any case within a reasonable period thereof or else a
presumption could be drawn that the family of the
deceased/incapacitated employee is not in immediate need
of financial assistance. Such appointment not being a
vested right, the right to apply cannot be exercised at any
time in future and it cannot be offered whatever the lapse of
time and after the crisis is over [see Eastern Coalfields
Ltd. v Anil Badyakar4]."
11. We are, therefore, in no position to come to the aid of the
petitioner.
12. The writ petition is completely devoid of merits and is
accordingly dismissed.
C. HARI SHANKAR, J
OM PRAKASH SHUKLA, J
JULY 30, 2025
AR
4 (2009) 13 SCC 112
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