Prasoon Nautiyal vs State of Uttarakhand & Ors.

Hon’ble Pankaj Purohit, J.

In this batch of writ petitions, all the petitioners were engaged as contractual Junior Engineer by the respondent-PWD. The petitioners were working with the respondent-PWD as contractual Junior Engineer for more than 10 to 15 years. The respondents disengaged the petitioners as their contractual appointment was not extended.

The petitioners have challenged the action on the part of the respondent-Department by filing these writ petitions seeking a writ of mandamus commanding respondent to take the petitioners back in service and to regularize them. Some of the petitioners’ claim for regularization has also been rejected and that rejection of their regularization is also under challenge.

This Court, keeping in view the qualification of the petitioners as well as the fact that they have been engaged on contractual basis after advertising these vacancies and they fulfill the minimum criteria, asked the respondent-State to come up with a mechanism to take these petitioners back in contractual employment.

The respondent-State has been fair enough with the Court submitted that the petitioners shall be accommodated against the vacancies on which they have been working by the strength of the interim order passed by this Court.

Since the petitioners were outnumbered the vacancies available at that juncture, the respondent-State submitted that the petitioners who were more than the vacancies i.e. 83, would be accommodated against 19 vacancies to be come up subsequent to the promotion given to the Junior Engineer to the post of Assistant Engineer and thus 19 vacancies were also available with the State.

Today Mr. Ganesh Dutt Kandpal, learned AAG made a statement before this Court, on instructions dated 06.08.2026 which are taken on record, that total 102 petitioners have been accommodated against the available vacancies (83 + 19). The detail of the petitioners have also been given in the instructions dated 06.08.2026 which is a case wise table prepared by the respondent-PWD.

It is stated by learned State counsel that petitioners have been given re-engagement as per the date of interim order passed by this Court.

Learned counsel for the petitioners (those who could not have been accommodated in the said list dated 06.08.2026) submitted that though they were senior to the candidates who have been accommodated, but they have been left out only for the reason that they could not get interim order in their writ petition.

Mr. M.C. Pant, learned counsel for the petitioners submits that four petitioners could not have been accommodated out of which one petitioner does have an interim order in his favour in WPSS No.79 of 2026, Ravindra Singh Chauhan Vs State of Uttarakhand, which is passed on 07.05.2026.

Mr. Ravi Bisht, learned counsel for the petitioners submits that there is stay order in favour of the petitioner of Writ Petition (S/S) No.1498 of 2026, Pushkar Pal Singh Bisht Vs State of Uttarakhand and interim order passed in his favour on 10.06.2026 yet he could not have been accommodated.

Learned counsel for the petitioners also submits that some of the petitioners have been still left out due to non availability of stay order in their favour.

Learned counsel for the State submits that they have accommodated the petitioners on the basis of date of their interim order and those who got the interim order earlier were accommodated first and petitioners who were not accommodated are the one who got interim order later on.

In the opinion of this Court, this cannot be criteria to deny accommodation to such petitioners.

The petitioners who have left out by the State due to non availability of the vacancies can still very well be accommodated against ten posts which were reserved for the candidates with disability till the regularly selected such candidates join.

It is further directed to the respondents that after accommodating all the petitioners against ten above vacancies and in the future vacancies, they shall undertake the process of regularization of the petitioners ignoring earlier rejection of their claim for regularization.

Accordingly, all the writ petitions stands disposed of.