Hon'ble Judges/Coram:
S.C. Agrawal and B.P. Jeevan Reddy

ORDER

B.P. Jeevan Reddy, J.

C.A. Nos. 9272-73 & 9277 of 1995 (arising out of S.L.P. (C) Nos. 6468 of 1987, 1682/88, and 8111/94), C.A. No. 2261/87, 5044/89, 4436/90, 18/90, W.P. (C) 1208/87 and 565/93. (Main Opinion)

Leave granted in Special Leave Petitions.

1. These appeals/writ petitions raise an important but difficult question concerning the nature of rule of reservation in promotions obtaining in the Railway service and the rule concerning the determination of seniority between general candidates and candidates belonging to reserved classes in the promoted category. The issue is best illustrated by taking the facts in the first of these matters, viz., Union of India and Ors. v. Virpal Singh Chauhan MANU/SC/0113/1996 : Civil Appeal No. 9272/95 arising from Special Leave Petition (C) No. 6468 of 1987. The appeal is preferred against the judgment of the Central Administrative Tribunal (Allahabad Bench) disposing of Original Application No. 647 of 1986 with certain directions. [It was originally filed as a writ petition in the Allahabad High Court which, on the Constitution of the Central Administrative Tribunal (Allahabad Bench), was transferred to the Tribunal] It was filed by, what may be called for the sake of convenience, employees not belonging to any of the reserved categories (hereinafter referred to as "general candidates" - which means open competition candidates). The Railway Administration as well as the employees belonging to reserved categories, i.e., Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes were impleaded as respondents. The writ petition/original application came to be filed in the following circumstances :

Among the category of Guards in the Railway service, there are four categories, viz., Grade 'C', Grade 'B', Grade 'A' and Grade 'A' special. The initial recruitment is made to Grade 'C' and they have to ascend rung after rung to go upwards. The promotion from one grade to another in this category is by seniority-cum-suitability. In other words, they are "non-selection posts". The rule of reservation is applied not only at the initial stage of appointment to grade 'C' but at every stage of promotion. The percentage reserved for Scheduled Castes is fifteen percent and for Scheduled Tribes 7.5%, a total of 22.5 percent. To give effect to the rule of reservation, a forty-point roster was prepared in which certain points were reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes respectively, commensurate with the percentage of reservation in their favour. For Scheduled Casles candidates, the places reserved in the roster were : 1, 8, 14, 22, 28 and 36 and in the case of Scheduled Tribes candidates, they were : 4, 17 and 31. Subsequently, a hundred-point roster has been prepared, again reflecting the aforesaid percentages.

2. In the year 1986, the position was that both th........