Allahabad HC Says Married Daughters of Co-Op Society Employees Entitled to Compassionate Appointment

The Allahabad High Court has recently struck down the word “unmarried” occurring in the note appended to Regulation 104 of UP Cooperative Societies Employees’ Service Regulations, 1975. The regulation provides for the recruitment of dependents of deceased employees of cooperative societies. A note appended to Regulation 104, earlier stated that “family” includes the wife/husband, sons, and unmarried or widowed daughters of the deceased employee.

The bench of Justices Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Om Prakash Shukla observed that though a proposal had already been made by UP Cooperative Institutional Service Board in the past to amend Regulation 104 to include daughters irrespective of their marital status under the definition of “family”; it had been turned down by the state government.

The division bench highlighted that taking an entirely different approach, the state government had amended the UP Recruitment of Dependants of Government Servants Dying in Harness Rules, 1974, in November 2021 to the effect that for compassionate appointment in respect of state government employees, “married daughters” will be included under the definition of “family”.

The bench said that since the rules for the state government employees had been amended, there was no plausible reason why the proposal made by the Institutional Service Board for making an amendment to Regulation 104 of the 1975 Service Regulations could be turned down by the state government.

“If compassionate appointment has been made available to the daughters irrespective of their marital status, of the State Government employees, there does not appear to be any reason why such benefit should be refused to the daughters of the deceased employees who have served a Cooperative Society in the State of Uttar Pradesh,” stated the bench.

Therefore, while striking down the term “unmarried daughter” from 1975 Service Regulations, the division bench opined that the facts of the present case reflected how the state can still be apathetic towards the cause of gender justice despite a clear declaration of law by the Supreme Court in the matter of compassionate appointment.

The court was dealing with a writ petition filed by one Neelam Devi whose father was employed as Assistant Branch Accountant with UP Cooperative Rural Development Bank. The petitioner’s father died in harness and accordingly, she, being his daughter, made an application seeking a compassionate appointment. However, the same was rejected solely on the ground that she was a married daughter of the deceased employee.

The bank had referred to the provisions contained in Regulation 104 of the 1975 Service Regulations which provided that it was only an unmarried daughter who was eligible for compassionate appointment.

The high court quashed the order passed by the bank rejecting the petitioner’s application and directed it to consider her claim afresh within a period of two months.