Delhi High Court
Jamotri Devi & Anr vs Government Of Chhattisgarh on 8 September, 2025
Author: C. Hari Shankar
Bench: C. Hari Shankar
$~72
* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
+ W.P.(C) 4579/2024 and CM APPL. 18781/2024
JAMOTRI DEVI & ANR. .....Petitioners
Through: Mr Shivendra Singh and Ms.
Prakriti Rastogi, Advocate
versus
GOVERNMENT OF CHHATTISGARH .....Respondent
Through: Mr. Prafull N. Bharat, Ld.
Advocate General with Mr. Apoorv Shukla,
Standing Counsel
CORAM:
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE C. HARI SHANKAR
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE OM PRAKASH SHUKLA
JUDGMENT(ORAL)
% 08.09.2025
1. Keshar Singh Rawat, who was working as an accountant at the
Chhattisgarh Bhawan, New Delhi, expired on 26 May 2022.
Petitioner 1 Jamotri Devi is his wife, and Petitioner 2 Niraj Singh is
his son. Petitioner 1 submitted an application to the Government of
Chhattisgarh, on 30 May 2022, for appointment of Petitioner 2 on
compassionate grounds. The application stands rejected by the
Resident Commissioner, Chhattisgarh Bhawan, invoking Clause 6(a)
of the Consolidated Instructions governing compassionate
appointment, framed in 20131 by the Chhattisgarh Government, on the
ground that Amrita Rawat, the daughter-in-law of Keshar Singh
Rawat, is in Government service. We deem it appropriate to reproduce
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
Clauses 5 and 6 of the 2013 Instructions, to the extent relevant, thus:
"5. Entitlement for grant of compassionate appointment -
Any one member, from the undernoted adult members of the
dependent family of the decease government servant, in the
sequence shown below, i.e, if (a) refuses or is not available, then
(b) and thereafter in the same sequence (c), (d) and (e) will be
considered for compassionate appointment:
(a) widow/widower of the deceased servant,
(b) son/adopted son,
(c) (unmarried)* daughter/unmarried adopted daughter,
(d) dependent widowed daughter/dependent adopted
widowed daughter,
(e) dependent divorced daughter/dependent adopted
divorced daughter,
(f) daughter-in-law**
6. Grant of compassionate appointment on death of
unmarried Government servant:-
*****
6(a) If, in the family of the deceased married Government
servant, any other member of the family is already in Government
service, then no other member of the family would be entitled to
compassionate appointment. *
**Explanation - The following family members would be included
in the dependent family members of married and unmarried
deceased Government servants:
(a) In case of a married Government servant -
dependent mother, father, widow/widower, son and
daughter (in these adopted son/daughter, widow/divorced
daughter are included) and daughter-in-law.
(b) In case of unmarried Government servant -
*******"
2. Aggrieved by the rejection of the application seeking
compassionate appointment for Petitioner 2, the present writ petition
1 "the 2013 Instructions" hereinafter
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
has been instituted before this Court. The writ petition initially prayed
that the rejection of the petitioners' application, as communicated vide
letters dated 10 October 2022 and 17 January 2024, be quashed, and
the Government of Chhattisgarh be directed to objectively consider
grant of compassionate appointment to Petitioner 2. Subsequently, the
petition was amended to incorporate prayers for quashing Clause 6(a)
of the 2013 Instructions to the extent it omitted to employ the word
"widowed" before "daughter-in-law" and that Explanation (a) below
Clause 6(a) be read so as to apply the adjective widowed/divorced, in
the parenthesis in the clause, to apply both to the daughter as well as
to the daughter-in-law.
3. Though the learned Advocate General, who appeared for the
State of Chhattisgarh, initially questioned the territorial jurisdiction of
this Court to entertain the present writ petition, the objection cannot,
in our view, be sustained, in view of the fact that Article 226(1)2 of the
Constitution extends the jurisdiction of this Court to issue, to any
person or authority, including any Government - which would include
the Government of Chhattisgarh - throughout the territory in respect
of which this Court exercises jurisdiction, writs, orders or directions.
The communications dated 10 October 2022 and 17 January 2024
have been issued by the Resident Commissioner, Chhattisgarh
Bhawan, New Delhi. Ergo, this Court would have the jurisdiction to
2 226. Power of High Courts to issue certain writs. -
(1) Notwithstanding anything in Article 32, every High Court shall have power, throughout
the territories in relation to which it exercises jurisdiction, to issue to any person or authority,
including in appropriate cases, any Government, within those territories directions, orders or writs,
including writs in the nature of habeas corpus, mandamus, prohibition, quo
warranto and certiorari, or any of them, for the enforcement of any of the rights conferred by Part
III and for any other purpose.
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
issue the writs sought by the petitioners.
4. Whether the petitioners are entitled to the reliefs sought is,
however, another matter altogether.
5. The decision to reject the petitioners' applications for
compassionate appointment is clearly in sync with Clause 6(a) of the
2013 Instructions, which disentitles all dependent family members of
a deceased Government servant from compassionate appointment if
any one member of the family is already in Government service.
There is no dispute about the fact that Amrita Rawat is in Government
service, as she works as a process server with the Haryana
Government. The respondents have, therefore, acted in accordance
with Clause 6(a) of the 2013 Instructions in refusing compassionate
appointment to Petitioner 2.
6. All depends, therefore, on whether the challenge, by the
petitioners, to Clause 6(a) can, or cannot, succeed.
7. Mr. Shivendra Singh, learned counsel for the petitioner, submits
that Clause 6(a) was inserted in the 2013 Instructions by amendments
made to the Instructions in March, April and August 2016 consequent
to a judgment passed by the High Court of Chhattisgarh on 18 January
2016 in WP(C) 5051/20143.
8. We do not think so.
3 Smt. Duliya Bai Yadav v State of Chhattisgarh and ors.
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
9. The judgment of the High Court of Chhattisgarh specifically
disapproved the exclusion of widowed daughters-in-law from the list
of family members of a deceased employee who died in harness who
were entitled to compassionate appointment. Even if it were to be
assumed that the amendments in the Instructions were consequent to
the said judgement - for which there is no real basis - it would only
affect the entitlement of the daughter-in-law to compassionate
appointment. The Instructions, as they stand, entitle all daughters-in-
law to compassionate appointment. We are not concerned, here, with
whether the entitlement to compassionate appointment, extended to
daughters-in-law, should extend only to widowed daughters-in-law or
would encompass all daughters-in-law.
10. The judgement in Duliya Bai Yadav, therefore, is, to our mind,
entirely irrelevant to the issue at hand.
11. We are concerned here with clause 6(a) of the Policy, which has
nothing to do with the entitlement of various family members to
compassionate appointment, which is essentially covered by Clause 5.
Clause 6(a) operates as an exception, and disentitles a member of a
family of an employee who dies in harness from compassionate
appointment if any other member of the family is in Government
service. Rule 5 is relevant to the extent that it includes, in the family
members of a deceased Government servant, his daughter-in-law. We
cannot read down the expression "member of the family" in Clause
6(a) to include only widowed daughters-in-law and exclude all other
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
daughters-in-law, including married daughters-in-law. That would
amount to re-writing the policy, which this Court cannot do.
12. There is, even otherwise, no logical basis for us to adopt such
an interpretation. It is well settled that compassionate appointment is
not an alternate mode of recruitment. It is merely a facility which is
provided to enable families to tide over the immediate financial
distress which befalls them when an earning family member dies. It is
open to the State to lay down standards on the basis of which it can be
decided whether the family is in distress. If the State Government has
sought to lay down, as such a standard, a proscription from
compassionate appointment in the event of another member of the
family of the deceased Government servant being already herself, or
himself, a Government servant, we see no illegality or inequity in the
said dispensation.
13. We may note, incidentally, that Mr. Shivendra Singh has
proceeded on the premise that the Explanation below Clause 6(a) of
the 2013 Instructions is an Explanation to Clause 6(a) itself. This, in
fact, appears to the entire basis of the edifice on which the writ
petition seeks to stand. This is obviously an erroneous assumption.
The Explanation is preceded by a double asterisk (**). The double
asterisk, earlier in the Instructions, has been placed after "daughter-in-
law" in Clause 6(f). The Explanation is, therefore, an Explanation to
Clause 5, and not Clause 6(a), despite its somewhat discordant
placement below Clause 6(a).
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
14. Clause 6(a) is, therefore, not fettered by any Explanation. As it
stands, it does not suffer from any legal or constitutional infirmity.
15. The challenge to the validity of clause 6(a) of the Policy is,
therefore, rejected.
16. Mr. Shivendra Singh points out that in Rules 10 and 11 of the
Policy, the expression used is "widowed daughters-in-law".
17. We are not concerned with the said Rules and therefore, do not
express any opinion in this regard.
18. In that view of the matter, the rejection of the petitioner's
application for compassionate appointment can also not be faulted.
19. The writ petition is, accordingly, dismissed.
C. HARI SHANKAR, J.
OM PRAKASH SHUKLA, J.
SEPTEMBER 8, 2025/aky/yg
W.P.(C) 4579/2024
