New Delhi

The Delhi High Court has held that an officer seeking allocation to their home State cadre under the All India Services Cadre Allocation Policy must necessarily indicate the home State as their first preference, and that merely expressing willingness to serve in the home State or listing it as a lower preference does not create any enforceable right.

Setting aside a Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) order, the court held that cadre allocation must strictly follow the preference order and the policy scheme, and cannot be altered by creating supernumerary posts.

A Division Bench of Justice Navin Chawla and Justice Madhu Jain allowed a writ petition filed by the Union of India challenging the CAT's 2014 direction to allocate the Rajasthan cadre to an Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer by creating a supernumerary post.

The officer joined the IFS in 2010 after qualifying for the 2009 examination and indicated Rajasthan as his home State as his sixth preference, with Himachal Pradesh as his first choice.

The High Court noted that although the officer had stated in his application that he was willing to be considered for his home State, his final, duly confirmed preference list placed Rajasthan sixth.

The Bench emphasised that under the Cadre Allocation Policy, candidates are allotted cadres based on merit, preference, and the available vacancies "at their turn," and that the policy does not permit overriding a candidate's stated preferences merely because an insider vacancy exists.

Interpreting Clauses 5 to 8 of the policy, the court held that insider vacancies are to be filled first by candidates who have designated their home State as their first preference. Only if such vacancies remain unfilled do the adjustment mechanisms for insider vacancies operate. Once that exercise is complete, any remaining insider vacancies are treated as outsider vacancies and filled on the basis of merit and the preferences of the remaining candidates.

The Bench rejected the tribunal's view that an officer who listed the home State as a lower preference must still be considered against insider vacancies.

Accepting such an interpretation, the court observed, would defeat the policy structure and could result in candidates being allocated a home cadre even when they were otherwise entitled, by merit, to one of their higher preferred cadres.

Reiterating settled law, the High Court underscored that no member of an All India Service has a vested right to be allocated a particular cadre or their home State.

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While an officer has a right to fair and lawful consideration under the applicable policy, cadre allotment remains an incidence of service, and officers must be prepared to serve in any State to which they are allocated.

Finding no illegality in the Union government's decision to allot the officer the Nagaland cadre his 22nd preference after he failed to qualify for Rajasthan on merit as an outsider candidate, the court set aside the CAT's order in its entirety.