Temporary appointment and later regularisation do not confer seniority from the initial date when service records support local-candidate status.

A temporary appointee who is later regularised as a local candidate cannot claim seniority from the date of the initial temporary appointment where the appointment was expressly pending further orders and the service records support that status. The Court noted that the posts claimed were not shown to be the same as the transferred permanent posts, which carried a different and higher pay structure and were protected under the reorganisation arrangements. The appellant's post had been treated as a different category outside the cadre, and the continued use of the old nomenclature did not alter its character. Seniority was therefore countable only from regularisation, not from the temporary entry date.

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Issues: Whether the appellant, appointed temporarily as Assistant Inspector of Labour and later regularised as a local candidate, was entitled to have his seniority reckoned from the date of initial appointment and to be treated as holding a higher transferred post rather than the post of Labour Inspector.

Analysis: The initial appointment was purely temporary and expressly made pending further orders. The posts claimed by the appellant were not shown to be the same as the regular posts transferred from Madras; the transferred officers were permanent appointees on a different and higher pay structure, protected under the reorganisation arrangements. The appellant's post had already been equated in Mysore to a different category, and the continuation of the old nomenclature did not change its character. The finding that the post was outside the cadre had become final, and the appellant's own service records and declaration at the time of regularisation described him as a temporary local candidate, which precluded him from later denying that status. Seniority could therefore be counted only from regularisation in 1967, not from the initial temporary appointment in 1960.

Conclusion: The claim for seniority from the date of initial appointment and for parity with the transferred officers was rejected.

Final Conclusion: The appellant had no legal basis to displace the seniority accorded to him on regularisation, and the challenge to the High Court's dismissal failed.

Ratio Decidendi: A temporary appointee who is regularised as a local candidate and whose service records and declaration support that status cannot claim seniority from the date of initial temporary appointment or equate himself with holders of transferred, regular cadre posts of a different character.

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