( 2025:HHC:39459 ) IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA CMP(M) No.367 of 2025 and LPA No.797 of 2025. Decided on: 19.11.2025 State of Himachal Pradesh & another ....Appellants Versus Sarita Devi ....Respondent Coram The Hon’ble Mr. Justice G.S. Sandhawalia, Chief Justice The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Jiya Lal Bhardwaj, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 For the Appellants : Mr. Anup Rattan, Advocate General with Ms. Priyanka Chauhan, Deputy Advocate General. For the Respondent : Mr. Suneel Awasthi, Advocate. G.S. Sandhawalia, Chief Justice (Oral). CMP(M) No.367 of 2025. Keeping in view the averments made in the application, duly supported by the affidavit of the official, delay of 120 days in filing the appeal is condoned. 2. The application stands disposed of. LPA No.797 of 2025. 3. The present Letters Patent Appeal is directed against the judgment passed by the learned Single Judge in 1 Whether reporters of Local Papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2 CWP No.7137 of 2023 titled Sarita Devi Vs. State of Himachal Pradesh and another, whereby the petition filed by the petitioner was allowed on 31.07.2024 and directions were issued to the respondents to consider the case of the petitioner in terms of the policy which was in vogue when her husband died. The directions were also issued that in case the petitioner is not fulfilling the eligibility criteria on the basis of her not possessing the minimum educational qualification, the employer may invoke its power of relaxation, as has been conferred upon it under the old policy/rules and take a sympathetic call in this regard to ensure that justice is done to the needy family. 4. Resultantly, vide order dated 27.02.2023 (Annexure P-5), passed by the Superintending Engineer, NH Circle, HPPWD, Shimla-4 was quashed and set aside. 5. The reasons which weighed with the learned Single Judge as such was that the bread earner of the family was Class- IV employee and had died in harness on 26.08.2016 after putting in more than 13 years of service with the Department. The initial application for compassionate appointment had been rejected on the ground that her husband was more than 50 years old at the time of his death, therefore, the petitioner was not entitled for appointment on compassionate basis, in view of the prevalent 3 policy at that point of time, when it was not to be granted to the dependents of such older employees. Thereafter, the guidelines had been revised with retrospective effect on 07.03.2019 and the case of the petitioner was re-considered and rejected on 27.02.2023 (Annexure P-5) on the ground that the petitioner does not possess the minimum educational qualification of being Middle pass. 6. It is not disputed that the writ petitioner who is the widow of deceased employee of the respondent-Department has three girl children to look after and thus, it apparently falls under the ambit of a genuine case. 7. The learned Single Judge was of the view that though the appointment on compassionate basis is an exception and not a normal course or source of recruitment to public employment, but it was for providing succour to the family whose bread earner had died. 8. While placing reliance upon the judgment of the Apex Court in State of Madhya Pradesh and others Vs. Ashish Awasthi (2022) 2 SCC 157, it was held that if there was a subsequent policy in place the consideration had to be done as per policy prevalent at the time of the death. 4 9. It is not disputed that vide policy dated 18.01.1990 (Annexure P-1), as per Clause-7, there is an extent of relaxation and power regarding the appointment of Class-IV employees which is to be relaxed in genuine cases. The relevant Clause reads as under:- “7) Extent of relaxation and power to make relaxation:- while providing employment on compassionate grounds the following relaxation can be made by the Administrative Department: (a) Recruitment procedure, i.e. without the agency of Public Service Commission or employment Exchange. (b) If there is ban on filling up the posts, the ban shall be deemed to have been releaxed for the purpose of making compassionate appointments. (c) The educational qualification for Class IV posts will be relaxable in genuine cases with the prior approval of the Cabinet. However in case of a widow of Govt. Servant to be appointed as Class IV employee, the educational qualification can be relaxed by the concerned Administrative Department. (d) Age relaxation shall not be given by any authority. Genuine cases will be placed before the Cabinet for allowing age relaxation by the Deptt. concerned.” 10. As per the revised policy dated 07.03.2019 (Annexure R-I), the appellants-State has stated in the reply that the power of relaxation is missing and there is a general bar as such for providing relaxation in the minimum educational qualification, while there is a flexibility of relaxation in upper or lower age limit for employment and in genuine cases which was placed before the Cabinet. 5 11. It is in such circumstances, counsel for the appellants-State has opposed the order passed by the learned Single Judge on account of the fact that subsequent policy has to be taken into consideration and the order of the learned Single Judge directing consideration in terms of the earlier policy, was not justified. 12. Vide order dated 02.05.2025, we had also noticed that there was alternative plea as such that the daughter of petitioner namely-Ms. Ranjana could be given the said benefits as she had the requisite qualification as per Annexure P-6 being a plus-two pass-out and directed the appellants-State to consider her case, keeping in view the fact that since the deceased had died on 26.08.2016, almost a decade ago. Unfortunately, the said order also has not been granted the due deference as such but the appellants-State has followed its blanket “stonewalling attitude” by holding out that the relaxation would open up a “pandora’s box” and the later policy would prevail, in view of the judgments of the Apex Court. The case of the daughter as such was rejected on the ground that the substitution of the deceased claims was also not permissible. 13. We are of the considered opinion that the State as such has lost sight of the fact that the primary purpose of the 6 compassionate appointment is to give succour to the family and to genuine cases, there can be no other genuine cases at all for a widow as such to support three girl children. 14. In spite of that the attitude of the State to pursue the litigation continue. The law as such has also been relied upon by the State primarily, placing reliance upon the judgment of the Apex Court in N.C. Santhosh Vs. State of Karnataka and Others (2020) 7 SCC 617, wherein it has been held that consideration should be done as per the policy in force. 15. However, counsel for the respondent has fallen back on another three-Judge Bench judgment of the Apex Court in State of Madhya Pradesh and Others Vs. Amit Shrivas (2020) 10 SCC 496, decided on 29.09.2020, subsequent of the judgment of N.C. Santhosh case (supra), which was decided on 04.03.2020. The observations in subsequent judgment as such would go on to show that it is the date of demise which has to be seen, unless a subsequent policy is made applicable retrospectively. The relevant pragraph reads as under:- “16. It is trite to say that there cannot be any inherent right to compassionate appointment but rather, it is a right based on certain criteria, especially to provide succour to a needy family. This has to be in terms of the applicable policy as existing on the date of demise, unless a subsequent policy is made applicable retrospectively. Insofar as providing succour is concerned, unfortunately, since the demise of the late father of the respondent, 11 years 7 have passed and really speaking, the aspect of providing succour to the family immediately does not survive. We have still examined the matter in the conspectus of the applicable policy. It is not in question that the Policy prevailing was one dated 18- 8-2008. Clause 12.1 clearly prescribes work- charge/contingency fund and daily wager employees from compassionate appointment. The gravemen of the submission of the respondent is based on the classification of his late father as a permanent employee on account of having worked for more than 15 years and the consequent regularisation of his service.” 16. It is also to be noticed that in the judgment of the Apex Court in State of Karnataka Vs. Bheemesh (2021) 20 SCC 707, while taking into consideration the three-Judge Bench judgment of N.C. Santhosh case (supra) another two Judge of the Apex Court as such had come to the conclusion that the fixed factor is only the date of death that does not change and therefore on account of the fact that the date of application and the date of consideration of the policy would be different, the differential treatement should not be given to the employees. The relevant paragraph reads as under:- “20. The important aspect about the conflict of opinion is that it revolves around two dates, namely, (i) date of death of the employee; and (ii) date of consideration of the application of the dependant. Out of these two dates, only one, namely, the date of death alone is a fixed factor that does not change. The next date, namely, the date of consideration of the claim, is something that depends upon many variables such as the date of filing of application, the date of attaining of majority of the claimant and the date on which the file is put up to the competent authority. There is no principle of statutory interpretation which permits a decision on the 8 applicability of a rule, to be based upon an indeterminate or variable factor. Let us take for instance a hypothetical case where 2 government serviant dies in harness on 1-1-2020. Let us assume that the dependants of these 2 deceased government servants make applications for appointment on 2 different dates say 29-5-2020 and 2-6-2020 and a modified Scheme comes into force on 1-6-2020. If the date of consideration of the claim is taken to be the criteria for determining whether the modified Scheme applies or not, it will lead to two different results, one in respect of the person who made the application before 1-6-2020 and another in respect of the person who applied after 1-6-2020. In other words, if two employees die on the same date and the dependants of those employees apply on two different dates, one before the modified Scheme comes into force and another thereafter, they will come in for differential treatment if the date of application and the date of consideration of the same are taken to be the deciding factor. A rule of interpretation which produces different results, depending upon what the individuals do or do not do, is inconceivable. This is why, the managements of a few banks, in the cases tabulated above, have introduced a rule in the modified scheme itself, which provides for all pending applications to be decided under the new/modified scheme. Therefore, we are of the considered view that the interpretation as to the applicability of a modified Scheme should depend only upon a determinate and fixed criteria such as the date of death and not an indeterminate and variable factor.” 17. Faced with this situation, the appellants-State has fallen back on the judgment of a two-Judge Bench of the Apex Court in State of Himachal Pradesh and Others Vs. Abhishek Kumar (2024) 5 SCC 280, to point out that the view in N.C. Santhosh case (supra), was held to be correct. 18. We have gone through the above said judgment in which the judgment in Amit Shrivas case (supra) also of a three- 9 Judge Bench, had been passed, subsequent to the judgment in N.C. Santhosh case (supra) had not been brought to the notice of the said Bench as such. 19. It is in such circumstances, keeping in view the law on precedent, we are of the considered opinion that once there is a conflict as such between the two Benches of equal strength of the Apex Court the judgment which lays down the law more elaborately is to be followed. 20. Reference can be made to the judgment of the Full- Bench in Indo Swiss Time Limited Vs. Umrao and Others AIR 1981 (Punjab & Haryana) 213, wherein it was observed as under:- “23. Now the contention that the latest judgment of a co-ordinate Bench is to be mechanically followed and must have pre-eminence irrespective of any other consideration does not commend itself to me. When judgments of the superior Court are of co- equal Benches and therefore of matching authority then their weight inevitably must be considered by the rationale and the logic thereof and not by the mere fortuitous circumstances of the time and date on which they were rendered. It is manifest that when two directly conflicting judgments of the superior Court and of equal authority are extant than both of them cannot be binding on the courts below. Inevitably a choice, though a difficult one, has to be made in such a situation. On principle it appears to me that the High Court must follow the judgment which appears to it to lay down the law more elaborately and accurately. The mere incidence of time whether the judgments of co-equal Benches of the superior Court are earlier or later is a consideration which appears to me as hardly relevant.” 10 21. Resultantly, we are of the considered opinion that the order dated 31.07.2024, passed by the learned Single Judge, in such circumstances is well justified and therefore we not only uphhold the same but also quash the order dated 16.09.2025, passed by the Additional Secretary (PW) to the Government of Himachal Pradesh during the pendency of the appeal, whereby the rejection had been done as noticed above. 22. It is also pertinent to notice that the same view has been followed by us in LPA No.214 of 2025 titled State of Himachal Pradesh & others Vs. Sh. Radha Mohan, decided on 06.05.2025. 23. Resultantly, the present appeal stands dismissed. 24. Pending miscellaneous application(s) if any, are accordingly disposed off. (G.S. Sandhawalia) Chief Justice (Jiya Lal Bhardwaj) Judge 19th November, 2025 (Munish Thakur)