Selection Committee Flaw No Ground to Oust 18-Year Staff: SC

Procedural Lapse in Government-Formed Selection Committee Cannot Oust Live Stock Inspectors After 18 Years: Supreme Court

Published: 29 October 2026 · NyayVidhan

The Supreme Court allowed three appeals and held that Live Stock Inspectors selected in 2006 and appointed in 2008 may continue in service, setting aside the Orissa Administrative Tribunal and High Court decisions that upheld their 2012 termination over the make-up of the Selection Committee; the State now supports them. A natural-justice defect may make a decision void ab initio or only voidable, it said, and the appointees were not at fault because the Government itself had constituted the committee (paras 3-5, 9-12).

Key holdings

Natural justice has two facets: defects that make a decision void ab initio, and procedural violations that make it merely voidable (para 9).

Appointees who were not at fault for a procedural lapse in a Government-constituted Selection Committee kept their posts after 18 years (paras 10-11).

Unselected candidates who took part in the same selection would, had they been selected, have supported it, the Court observed (para 10).

The Tribunal and High Court decisions upholding the terminations were set aside and the fresh selection list direction was quashed (para 11).

Judgment digest by NyayVidhan: a summary of the court's judgment, not its text. The judgment itself is the authoritative version.

Brief Facts

Under a 16.01.2004 advertisement by the Director, Veterinary and Animal Husbandry, Odisha, 45 candidates were interviewed for Live Stock Inspector posts; selection followed in 2006 and appointments in 2008 (paras 2-3). A 2000 Government notification had left the Project Director, DRDA off the Selection Committee; one of 28.11.2003 added that authority (para 2). After the Tribunal dismissed unselected candidates' challenges in 2011, the Additional Secretary of the Fisheries and ARD Department began a suo motu proceeding and, because that authority sat on the committee, recommended declaring the selection null and void (para 4). The appellants and 11 others were terminated on 27.06.2012; the Tribunal and the High Court upheld this, and a fresh selection list was directed (para 4).

Court's Findings

The Court held that both the Tribunal and the High Court had committed a serious error (para 9). The principle of natural justice, it explained, has two facets: one makes the very decision void ab initio, on the face of it, while the other concerns a procedural violation that only makes the decision voidable (para 9). Applying this, it noted that the appellants and the private respondents had all taken part in the same selection process, so that the private respondents, had they been selected, would have been on the appellants' side (para 10). The appellants had continued in service for 18 years, and the so-called procedural violation in constituting the Selection Committee was in no way their fault, since admittedly the Government had constituted the committee by notification (para 10). On those observations and reasons, the Court set aside the High Court's judgment and the Tribunal's order, held the appellants entitled to continue in service, and quashed the direction to the State authorities to prepare a fresh selection list (para 11). The order does not say expressly into which facet this defect fell and cites no decision.

Legal Principle

A breach of natural justice does not always nullify a decision: some defects make it void ab initio, while a procedural violation only makes it voidable (para 9). Where the Government itself constituted the selection committee and the blameless appointees had served for 18 years, a procedural flaw in its constitution did not justify ousting them (paras 10-11).

NyayVidhan's view · Practice note

Why It Matters

For employees whose selection is reopened years later because of a flaw in how the Government set up the selection committee, this order is useful support: the Court separated defects that make a decision void ab initio from procedural violations that make it only voidable, and weighed that the appointees were not at fault and had served for 18 years (paras 9-10). Departments reviewing old recruitments on their own motion should keep that distinction in mind before terminating appointees. The order is short and cites no authority, and it does not say whether its relief reaches the 11 others terminated with the appellants (paras 4, 11), so it should be read on its own facts.

Editorial comment by the NyayVidhan Editorial Desk. It is not part of the Court's judgment and is not legal advice.