Appointment on compassionate ground is a concession not a right and the object of granting such employment is to enable the affected family to tide over a sudden crisis, the Supreme Court has said.

The apex court had set aside the judgement of a division bench of the Kerala High Court, which confirmed the verdict of a single judge directing the Fertilisers and Chemicals Travancore Ltd (FACT) and others to consider the case of a woman for appointment on compassionate ground. A bench of Justices MR Shah and Krishna Murari noted that the father of the woman was employed with FACT and died while on duty in April 1995. At the time of his death, it noted, his wife was serving and therefore not eligible for appointment on compassionate ground.

Article 14 of the Constitution deals with equality before law and Article 16 with equality of opportunity in matters of public employment. “However, appointment on compassionate ground offered to a dependent of a deceased employee is an exception to the said norms. The compassionate ground is a concession and not a right,” the bench said in its judgement delivered on September 30. “The whole object of granting compassionate employment is, thus, to enable the family to tide over the sudden crisis. The object is not to give such family a post much less a post held by the deceased,” the bench said. Setting aside HC judgement, it said both the single judge as well as the division bench had committed an error in directing the appellants to reconsider her case for appointment on compassionate ground.

‘Petition seeking relief of pre-arrest bail not money recovery proceedings’

The Supreme Court has remarked that the petitions seeking relief of pre-arrest bail are not money recovery proceedings, while maintaining anticipatory bail to a husband and his relatives and annulling the conditions of depositing money. A bench of Justice Dinesh Maheshwari and Bela M Trivedi granted an anticipatory bail plea to the husband and parents-in-law in the matter on furnishing a bond of Rs 25,000. Jharkhand HC had earlier proceeded to grant the concession of pre-arrest bail to appellants on condition of their furnishing a bond in sum of Rs 25,000 and depositing a demand draft of Rs 7,50,000 as an ad-interim victim compensation. The petitioners had challenged the condition of depositing Rs 7,50,000 as a condition of bail in the top court.