State To Decide Application For Compassionate Appointment If Made After 5 Years, Not Appointing Authority: Allahabad High Court

Recently, the Allahabad High Court has held if an application for compassionate appointment is made beyond the permissible limit of 5 years, it is not up to the appointing authority to consider the matter. “A reading of the proviso to Rule 5 of the Rules of 1974, apart from the law about the relevant and material facts, on the basis of which, the power to condone a delay beyond five years ought be exercised, shows that the power to condone the delay in making an application about compassionate appointment beyond five years vests in the State Government; not the Appointing Authority”, held the Court. “By no stretch of the plain phraseology of the proviso to Rule 5 of the Rules of 1974 did the Commandant, acting as the Appointing Authority, had jurisdiction to decide the petitioner's application, seeking compassionate appointment, once it was made beyond the period of five years”, held the Court. “We are constrained to say that the Commandant, 41st Battalion, PAC, Ghaziabad, once she reached the conclusion that the application as beyond the period of five years, envisaged under Rule 5 of the Rules of 1974 made in the sixth year, as she says, should have laid her hands off the matter and referred it to the State Government, following the course that we have indicated.” The Court quashed the order passed by the Commandant, 41st Battalion, Provincial Armed Constabulary, Ghaziabad and directed that the petitioner's application be placed before the State Government and that she be allowed to make afresh representations before them.