The Supreme Court held that the doctrine of “equal pay for equal work” cannot be applied mechanically merely because two categories of employees perform functionally similar duties, and that a difference in experience between directly recruited and promoted employees can be a valid basis for a difference in pay scales.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court has held that the doctrine of “equal pay for equal work” cannot be mechanically applied simply because two categories of employees discharge functionally similar duties, ruling that a difference in experience between directly recruited employees and those appointed by promotion or transfer can constitute a valid and intelligible basis for placing them in different pay scales [GP Sangeetha and Others v. State of Kerala and Others].
A Bench of Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Sheel Nagu so held while dismissing appeals filed by a group of directly recruited Higher Secondary School Teachers, Junior (HSST, Jr.) in Government-aided schools in Kerala, who had sought pay-scale parity with HSST, Jr. teachers appointed through transfer or promotion.
The dispute
The appellants had been appointed through direct recruitment under a 1998 government order and claimed the full-time pay scale extended to HSST, Jr. teachers appointed by transfer or promotion, contending that both categories performed identical duties within the same cadre. A Single Judge of the Kerala High Court, relying on Supreme Court precedents, held that the appellants had suffered grave discrimination. A Division Bench, however, reversed that view, holding that promoted teachers could not be equated with direct recruits who were freshers, the benefit of full pay to the promotees being intended merely to protect the status they already enjoyed before promotion. The directly recruited teachers then approached the Supreme Court.
Senior Advocates V. Giri and Dr. Menaka Guruswamy, for the appellants, argued that the precedents the Single Judge had relied on were from the last century, and that the judicial interpretation of the equal-pay doctrine has undergone a significant shift since then.
How the doctrine has evolved
Tracing the trajectory of the case law, the Court explained how the doctrine had narrowed over time. It observed that in the last century, following Randhir Singh v. Union of India, the Court treated equal pay for equal work as an expansive anti-exploitation principle under Articles 14 and 39(d), where the mere sameness of designation, “teacher with teacher, accountant with accountant, clerk with clerk, driver with driver,” was sufficient to claim parity. In this century, however, it noted, beginning with State Bank of India v. M.R. Ganesh Babu and up to State of Bihar v. Bihar Secondary Teachers Struggle Committee, the doctrine had been “recast as a strict test based on service rules.”
Setting out that stricter test, the Court held:
“Decisions are legion that equal pay cannot be claimed by merely showing identical work; the claimant-employee must establish complete parity in the source of recruitment, educational qualifications and experience, mode of appointment through a constitutional process, and nature of responsibilities and accountability. Mere functional similarity of work has been held to be no longer enough.”
Relying on M.R. Ganesh Babu, the Court reiterated that equal pay cannot be judged by the mere volume of work, since there may be qualitative differences in reliability and responsibility, and that a bona fide, reasonable and rational value judgment by administrative authorities in fixing pay scales does not amount to discrimination. It also drew on Government of West Bengal v. Tarun Kumar Roy, which held that holders of higher educational qualifications can be treated as a separate class, and that employees doing similar work but differing in qualification may be treated differently, and on State of Haryana v. Charanjit Singh, which endorsed that equal pay must be for equal work “of equal value” and that the doctrine has no mechanical application.
Experience as a valid differentia
Summarising the position from Bihar Secondary Teachers Struggle Committee, the Court held that a “mechanical application of the doctrine of equal pay for equal work has to be eschewed,” while clarifying that this did not mean the doctrine could never be enforced. Enforcement, it held, requires consideration of “a host of factors,” and only where there is complete parity across all of them, and equal pay is claimed for equal work of equal value, can a writ court intervene.
“Even though persons may do the same work, their quality of work may differ. Where persons are selected by a Selection Committee on the basis of merit with due regard to seniority a higher pay scale granted to such persons who are evaluated by the competent authority cannot be challenged. A classification based on difference in educational qualifications justifies a difference in pay scales.”
Applying these principles, the Court held that the difference in experience between the transferee/promotee HSST, Jr. teachers and the direct-recruit HSST, Jr. teachers furnished a valid and intelligible differentia, bearing a nexus with the object sought to be achieved, so as to justify a higher pay scale for the former. The two groups, it held, could not claim equivalence in terms of experience in rendering service as teachers, which was a valid criterion for differentiation in pay.
A precedent held per incuriam
The appellants had sought to distinguish Bihar Secondary Teachers Struggle Committee by relying on the Calcutta High Court’s decision in State of West Bengal v. Anirban Ghosh, pointing out that a special leave petition against it had been dismissed by the Supreme Court. The Court rejected that reliance, holding that the binding precedents noticed in Bihar Secondary Teachers Struggle Committee did not appear to have been placed before the Division Bench in Anirban Ghosh, and that, to the extent it was inconsistent with those binding precedents, the decision had to be held per incuriam. The mere dismissal of a special leave petition, it added, would not be sufficient to take a different view. Upholding the Division Bench, the Court dismissed the appeals.
Why the judgment matters
The decision is a valuable consolidation of the modern law on “equal pay for equal work,” a doctrine invoked in a very large volume of service litigation. It confirms the doctrinal shift the Court itself charts: from the broad, anti-exploitation reading of Randhir Singh, under which identical designation could ground a parity claim, to a far more demanding, rules-based test under which a claimant must establish complete parity across recruitment source, qualifications, experience, mode of appointment and responsibility. For the vast body of government and aided-institution employees who routinely argue that “same work must mean same pay,” the judgment is a clear signal that functional similarity, by itself, is no longer enough.
Equally important is the specific holding that experience is a constitutionally valid basis for differentiating pay, even between employees in the same cadre doing the same work. By treating the greater experience of promotee teachers as an intelligible differentia with a rational nexus to the pay classification, the Court reaffirmed that Article 14 permits reasonable classification, and that administrative value judgments on pay, if bona fide and rational, will not be lightly disturbed. The judgment is likely to be widely cited in pay-parity disputes, and its clarification that a decision inconsistent with binding precedent is per incuriam, and that the dismissal of a special leave petition is not itself a binding precedent, adds a useful point on the doctrine of precedent for practitioners.
Case Title: GP Sangeetha and Others v. State of Kerala and Others
Bench: Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Sheel Nagu
Citation: 2026 LiveLaw (SC) 948