W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 1 of 7 $~67 * IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI + W.P.(C) 1992/2026 & CM APPL. 9687/2026 UPASNA AND ANR .....Petitioners Through: Mr. Ankur Chhibber, Mr. Sachin Mighlani and Mr. Anshuman Mehrotra, Advocates. versus UNION OF INDIA AND ORS .....Respondents Through: Mr. Farman Ali CGSC with Ms. Usha Jamnal, Advocate for R-1. Mr. Gaurav Khanna, Mr. Gautam B. and Ms. Sakshi Attri, Advocates for R-2 to 4. CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE SANJEEV NARULA O R D E R % 12.02.2026 1. The Petitioners are outsourced personnel presently deployed as System Engineers with Respondent No. 2, National Highways & Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited.1 Petitioner No. 1 and Petitioner No. 2 were first engaged as Data Entry Operators on 16th February, 2015 and 9th March, 2015 respectively. The petition asserts continuous engagement since then, with periodic renewals. 2. Respondent No. 2 was incorporated in 2014 as a Central Public Sector Undertaking under the administrative control of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. From inception, the Corporation has staffed its 1 “NHIDCL” This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 2 of 7 functions through a mix of deputationists, contractual hires and personnel supplied through third-party agencies. 3. The Petitioners claim that over time, their contracts were renewed on the basis of satisfactory performance and growing organisational needs. They also claim progression in roles from Data Entry Operator to Office Assistant and IT Assistant (later re-designated as IT Engineer), culminating in their present designation as System Engineers. 4. The immediate trigger is the notification of the National Highways & Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (Recruitment, Seniority and Promotion) Rules, 2025 on 1st August, 2025. The Petitioners point to Rule 3.1, which excludes persons engaged through third-party outsourcing agencies or on fixed-term contracts from the coverage of those Rules. 5. Apprehending displacement with no pathway to absorption under the 2025 Rules, the Petitioners submitted a representation on 23rd December, 2025. It remains pending. The Petitioners therefore seek a writ of mandamus for regularisation and pay parity. Contentions: 6. Mr. Ankur Chhibber, counsel for the Petitioners, assails the 2025 Recruitment Rules as exclusionary and arbitrary, and urges that the Petitioners have been denied any fair route to regularisation after long service. The case, in substance, runs on these themes: 6.1 More than a decade of continuous deployment, coupled with repeated renewals and role progression, created a legitimate expectation that regularisation would follow once formal recruitment rules were framed. The Corporation, having benefitted from their work during its formative years, cannot now treat them as dispensable by invoking the new Rules. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 3 of 7 6.2. The Petitioners claim they perform duties comparable to regular and deputationist staff, including participation in financial committees and conducting trainings. Reliance is placed on State of Punjab v. Jagjit Singh2 to press the principle of “equal pay for equal work under Article 14 and Article 39(d) of the Constitution. 6.3. The Petitioners’ roles are essential and integral to the IT Department, which is managed almost entirely by 26 outsourced employees. Labelling such indispensable and long-term service as “temporary” or “outsourced” is a mechanism to evade statutory obligations, as noted by the Supreme Court in Jaggo v. Union of India.3 6.4. Since the Petitioners were promoted based on deliberations of their performance and have served for over ten years, their appointments have acquired a substantive character against sanctioned or required posts. In this regard, reliance is placed on Somesh Tapliyal v. HNB Garhwal University.4 6.5. Rule 3.1 of the 2025 Rules is inequitable and discriminatory. By excluding outsourced staff who have handled the core functions of the IT department for a decade, the Respondents have rendered the Petitioners’ long and unblemished service meaningless, effectively depriving them of their livelihood. 6.6. In Sachin Agarwal & Ors. v. UOI,5 this Court has already granted interim protection to employees with more than five years of service, directing that their employment not be disturbed. 2 (2017) 1 SCC 148. 3 2024 SCC OnLine 3826. 4 (2021) 10 SCC 116. 5 In W.P.(C) 16653/2025 decided on 20th January, 2026. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 4 of 7 6.7 The Petitioners also rely on the Division Bench judgment of this Court in Director CGHS v. Ram Chander & Ors.6 It is submitted that in a similar factual matrix involving Data Entry Operators engaged through various vendors over an extended period, the Court granted the relief of regularization to the workmen. 7. The Respondents oppose the petition at the threshold on maintainability. The principal objection is that no direct employer-employee relationship exists between the Petitioners and Respondent No. 2. It is urged that the Petitioners were engaged through private contractors who raised bills for their services, and that the paper record shows employment with the outsourcing agencies. Joint Secretary, CBSE v. Raj Kumar Mishra7 is relied upon to submit that workplace supervision or allocation of duties does not, by itself, create a direct employer-employee relationship with the principal organisation. Analysis and findings: 8. The petition seeks a writ of mandamus for regularisation and pay parity against Respondent No. 2. Such relief presupposes either (i) a demonstrable employer-employee relationship between the Petitioners and Respondent No. 2 on the record before the writ court, or (ii) clear material showing that the outsourcing arrangement is a façade and that Respondent No. 2 is, in substance, the true employer. Without crossing that threshold, the Court cannot convert a third-party engagement into a public employment relationship by judicial direction. 6 2025 :DHC :11446-DB. 7 2025 SCC OnLine SC 2048. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 5 of 7 9. The annexures filed with the petition do not support the Petitioners on this foundational requirement. They reveal a consistent documentary pattern across years and across agencies. Salary slips and statutory particulars (including PF and ESIC identifiers) appear in the name of the outsourcing agency. Appointment letters and fixed-term engagement letters are issued by private entities, and extensions are also issued by the same agencies. In these documents, Respondent No. 2 is repeatedly described as the “client”, while the agency describes the engagement as contractual, fixed-term, project specific, and co-terminus with the project or the underlying service arrangement between the agency and the client. The power to discontinue the engagement is reserved to the agency, typically on grounds such as performance or project closure. This is not a stray feature. It is the constant thread. 10. This documentary spine carries legal consequences. The Supreme Court has repeatedly cautioned that workplace supervision, allocation of tasks, or day-to-day control at the client site does not, by itself, establish direct employment with the client.8 Outsourcing arrangements necessarily involve instructions and supervision at the place where services are rendered, otherwise the contract would be unworkable. The decisive enquiry is whether the legal incidents of employment lie with the client or with the agency. Here, the Petitioners’ own record places those incidents with the agencies: the engagement letters are theirs, the tenure is framed by them, extensions are issued by them, payroll documentation is theirs, and disengagement clauses are reserved by them. 8 Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd. v. Mahendra Prasad Jakhmola & Ors. (2019) 13 SCC 82; International Airport Authority of India v. International Air Cargo Workers’ union & Anr. (2009) 13 SCC 374. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 6 of 7 11. The Petitioners rely on long deployment and role progression. Even if the deployment at Respondent No. 2 has been continuous in a practical sense, the documents show that the employment has been channelled through successive outsourcing agencies. That feature weakens, rather than strengthens, the plea of “substantive appointment”. In law, a change of vendor with renewed fixed-term engagement is consistent with tender- driven outsourcing. It does not, without cogent evidence of direct appointment and control by the principal organisation, translate into absorption into the organisation’s cadre. 12. The reliance on CGHS v. Ram Chander does not carry the Petitioners across this hurdle. That decision turned on a factual finding, on a proved record, that the contractual layer was a sham. A writ court can disregard an intermediary only when the material shows that the intermediary is a name- lender and the principal employer has, in substance, exercised the core employer functions. The present record, as reflected even in the illustrative annexures placed by the Petitioners, does not permit such a finding. The outsourcing documents consistently acknowledge the agencies as the contracting employers and Respondent No. 2 as the client. 13. There is, in addition, a structural limitation. Regularisation into a public post cannot be directed merely because the work is long-running or because the organisation benefits from the services. Public employment is governed by recruitment rules and by the constitutional discipline of equal opportunity. Where the record shows engagement through outsourcing agencies, the Court cannot, through mandamus, rewrite the mode of appointment and compel entry into the cadre outside the recruitment framework. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13 W.P.(C) 1992/2026 Page 7 of 7 14. The pay parity claim, anchored in State of Punjab v. Jagjit Singh, also cannot succeed in the present form. The “equal pay for equal work” doctrine operates within a legally established employer-employee relationship. Once the record shows the Petitioners as employees of outsourcing agencies deployed at a client site, the writ court cannot, without first finding direct employment with Respondent No. 2 or a sham arrangement, issue pay-scale directions against Respondent No. 2 on the premise of parity with regular staff.9 15. Rule 3.1 of the 2025 Rules, which excludes outsourced and fixed-term personnel, does not advance the Petitioners’ case for mandamus. Recruitment rules are meant to regulate entry, seniority and promotion within the cadre. Outsourced engagements stand on a different legal footing. Treating the exclusion as unconstitutional would, in effect, compel absorption of vendor-supplied personnel into the cadre, which is not a course available in writ jurisdiction on the present record. 16. For these reasons, the petition fails on the central requirement of establishing a direct employment relationship with Respondent No. 2 or a factual basis to disregard the outsourcing layer as a camouflage. The prayer for regularisation and pay parity is accordingly declined. 17. Dismissed. Pending application(s), if any, stand disposed of. SANJEEV NARULA, J FEBRUARY 12, 2026/as 9 Municipal Council, Rep. by its Commissioner Nandyal Municipality v. K. Jayaram & Ors., Special Leave Petition (Civil) Nos. 17711-17713 of 2019. This is a digitally signed order. The authenticity of the order can be re-verified from Delhi High Court Order Portal by scanning the QR code shown above. The Order is downloaded from the DHC Server on 16/02/2026 at 14:33:13