Supreme Court ruled that High Courts cannot disturb the finality of Apex Court orders. It added that non-parties affected by a judgment in rem may seek appropriate remedies in service matters.
A Supreme Court bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Aravind Kumar held that a High Court cannot unsettle the finality of an order previously passed by the Apex Court in favor of a litigant.
The Court also clarified the remedies available to persons who were not parties to earlier proceedings but are adversely affected by a judgment in rem, particularly in the context of service law.
The decision arose from long-standing litigation over the qualifications and promotions of technical education teachers in Kerala.
The controversy originated from Rule 6A of the Kerala Technical Education Service (Amendment) Rules, 2004, which provided an exemption and a seven-year grace period for obtaining a Ph.D. for promotion to the posts of Assistant Professor (later renamed Associate Professor) and Professor.
This rule had been framed in response to AICTE notifications that required a Ph.D. as the minimum qualification.
The Kerala High Court initially invalidated Rule 6A, but the Supreme Court reversed that order in Christy James Jose v. State of Kerala (2016) and upheld appointments made under the rule.
Following the Supreme Court’s earlier ruling, the appellants in the present case (Dr. Jiji K.S. & Ors.) obtained similar relief in Civil Appeal No. 4502 of 2016.
The State Government then promoted them to the Associate Professor cadre with retrospective effect by issuing a Government Order in March 2019. Later, additional Original Applications were filed before the Kerala Administrative Tribunal (KAT) challenging various other GOs concerning promotions and reversions; the KAT quashed those GOs.
On appeal, the Kerala High Court, by its judgment dated December 3, 2020, issued broad directions holding that AICTE Regulations prevail over State Rules and that a Ph.D. is mandatory for promotions after March 5, 2010.
The present appellants were not parties to the proceedings before the KAT or the High Court and contended that the High Court’s sweeping directives effectively nullified benefits previously conferred on them by the Supreme Court’s 2016 orders.
Senior Counsel Jaideep Gupta, for the appellants, argued that the High Court had effectively revisited the Supreme Court’s conclusive order in respect of the appellants.
He submitted that once the Apex Court had settled their rights in its earlier orders, the High Court could not disturb that finality. In a connected matter (SLP (Civil) No. 18961/2022), counsel Vaheeda Babu argued that her client’s promotion date to Professor was reassigned detrimentally due to the High Court’s judgment, although he had not been a party to those proceedings.
The Supreme Court accepted the appellants’ submission on the finality of its own orders, observing that the appellants had already been promoted in compliance with the Court’s 2016 directions and that,
“This Court, having granted an order in favour of the appellants, there could arise no occasion for the High Court to disturb the finality attached to the same.”
The Court added that if the appellants had been impleaded before the High Court and the Supreme Court’s earlier order had been placed on record, the difficulty might have been avoided.
On the broader point of remedies for non-parties affected by judgments in service cases, the bench relied on established precedent to set out available options:
- Review petitions for non-parties: Referring to K. Ajit Babu v. Union of India (1997), the Court observed that many service judgments operate as judgments in rem, and aggrieved persons may seek review on the limited grounds permitted under Order XLVII of the Code of Civil Procedure, subject to the limitation period.
- Fresh applications before tribunals: Citing Rama Rao v. M.G. Maheshwara Rao (2007), the Court noted that persons not impleaded previously can approach the appropriate tribunal by filing an application under Section 19 of the Administrative Tribunals Act to ventilate their grievances.
- Locus to seek review: Relying on Union of India v. Nareshkumar Badrikumar Jagad (2019), the Court observed that a non-party who considers themselves aggrieved and can satisfy the court of that position may be permitted to seek review of the earlier order.
The Supreme Court allowed the appeal filed by Dr. Jiji K.S. & Ors., granting relief confined strictly to their specific claims.
The bench directed that “nothing said in the impugned order of the High Court will affect their career prospects in view of the special facts noticed above.”
As for the intervenors and the petitioner in the connected SLP who were aggrieved by the High Court’s order but were not parties to it, the Court declined to make factual determinations in their cases.
Instead, those applicants and petitioners were given liberty to pursue appropriate remedies before the competent forums in accordance with law and the precedents cited.