Chhattisgarh HC Strikes Down Recruitment Rules for Denying Ophthalmic Assistants Any Promotional Avenue

A Division Bench at Bilaspur held that the Class-III Recruitment Rules, 2013 are arbitrary and violate Articles 14 and 16 by leaving Ophthalmic Assistants with no path for career progression, and directed the State to frame suitable rules within six months.

Nine Ophthalmic Assistants (नेत्र सहायक) posted at Government Primary Health Centres across Chhattisgarh — in districts including Mahasamund, Raipur, Dhamtari, Balod, Bemetara, Rajnandgaon, Sakti, Bastar (Jagdalpur), and Mahasamund — approached the High Court of Chhattisgarh at Bilaspur under Article 226 of the Constitution. Each had been appointed through direct recruitment and had served for more than ten years with, by their account, unblemished service records. Their singular complaint: the Chhattisgarh Health and Family Welfare Department Non-Clerical Paramedical and Nursing (Directorate Health Service) Class-III Recruitment Rules, 2013 contain no promotional hierarchy for the post of Ophthalmic Assistant, leaving the entire cadre in permanent stagnation. The Division Bench, led by Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Ravindra Kumar Agrawal, accepted the petition, declared the Rules arbitrary and violative of Articles 14 and 16 to that extent, and gave the State six months to frame an appropriate promotional avenue.

The Dispute Before the High Court

The nine petitioners — Vidyasagar Ratre, Salik Ram Nourange, Lomesh Kumar Kurre, Ghanshyam Puri, Lokesh Kumar, Sanjeev Kumar Yadav, Dikpal Tandon, Divya Pandey, and Bhanu Pratap Dhruw — sought two specific reliefs. They asked the Court to declare the Recruitment Rules, 2013 ultra vires to the extent that they provide no promotional channel for Ophthalmic Assistants, and to direct insertion of a promotional avenue into the relevant schedule and rules.

Their grievance rested on a straightforward factual foundation. Since their appointment, no promotion has ever been available to them. The Rules simply do not contemplate any higher post to which an Ophthalmic Assistant can be elevated. The petitioners pointed to a communication dated 6 December 2021 from the Under Secretary, in which the State itself acknowledged the anomaly and disclosed that a committee had been constituted to examine the issue. More than four years elapsed without any outcome from that committee.

Petitioners' counsel Mr. Ajay Shrivastava drew comparisons with six other States — Odisha, Jharkhand, Bihar, Punjab, Haryana, and Rajasthan — where service rules provide promotional avenues for Ophthalmic Assistants. In Odisha, he pointed out, a four-tier promotional hierarchy has been notified. He relied on a judgment of the same High Court in Bhaypal Singh Kanwar v. State of Chhattisgarh and Others (WPS No. 3004 of 2025, decided 23 January 2026), which addressed a structurally similar stagnation complaint for the post of Tracer.

The State's Position

Deputy Advocate General Mr. Prasun Bhaduri resisted the petition on several grounds. He argued that there is no fundamental or vested right to claim promotion or to demand creation of promotional posts. The determination of service conditions, including promotional avenues and the creation of posts, falls exclusively within the State's policy domain. He contended that the Recruitment Rules, 2013 were framed by the competent authority under its statutory powers and their validity could not be questioned merely because they do not provide a promotional channel for one particular cadre.

On the comparison with other States, the Deputy Advocate General submitted that service conditions in each State are independently framed keeping in view its own administrative requirements, financial resources, and policy considerations. The fact that Odisha or other States have promotional hierarchies for Ophthalmic Assistants creates no enforceable legal right in favour of employees of Chhattisgarh.

He also sought to limit the significance of the December 2021 communication. That letter, he argued, merely indicated that the issue was under consideration by a committee. It did not confer any accrued or enforceable right on the petitioners, nor could it be read as a governmental decision to amend the Rules. The creation of promotional posts and restructuring of cadres involves complex administrative and financial considerations and courts, he submitted, ought not to direct the State to frame or amend statutory rules in a particular manner under Article 226.

On Article 14 and 16, the Deputy Advocate General's position was that all Ophthalmic Assistants in Chhattisgarh are uniformly governed by the same Rules. Absence of a promotional avenue applies across the entire cadre without distinction, and therefore there is no hostile discrimination or unequal treatment within the State.

How the Bench Reasoned

The Division Bench opened its analysis by acknowledging the general principle that policy decisions relating to service conditions and framing of recruitment rules ordinarily do not warrant judicial interference. It then identified the limit of that principle: where policy results in manifest arbitrariness, unreasonable classification, or complete denial of any promotional avenue leading to perpetual stagnation of a particular cadre, constitutional courts are duty-bound to exercise the power of judicial review under Articles 14 and 16.

The bench found that the State had not been able to justify why the cadre of Ophthalmic Assistant alone had been left without any promotional avenue while similarly placed technical cadres had been provided a promotional hierarchy under the same statutory framework. The comparative position in other States was treated not as creating a parallel legal right, but as evidence that a promotional channel for this cadre is administratively feasible — a relevant consideration in assessing whether the omission is arbitrary.

The bench applied the reasoning it had adopted in Bhaypal Singh Kanwar, where it had struck down portions of the Rules of 2018 to the extent they eliminated the post and promotional channel for Tracer and had directed the respondent authorities to frame suitable rules within six months. That judgment had held that “the petitioner cannot be left remediless and subjected to perpetual stagnation.”

Applying that logic to the present case, the bench held that the prolonged inaction of the respondents — despite constituting a committee as early as 6 December 2021 — also could not be countenanced. The absence of any promotional avenue, left unaddressed for over four years after the State's own acknowledgment, crossed the threshold from policy discretion into manifest arbitrariness.

The bench was careful to limit the scope of its intervention. It declined to direct the creation of any particular promotional post or hierarchy, treating the precise structure of such a mechanism as a matter for the executive. What it did hold is that the Recruitment Rules, 2013, to the extent they fail to provide any promotional channel for the post of Ophthalmic Assistant, are arbitrary and violative of Articles 14 and 16 and therefore cannot be sustained.

Order

The writ petition was allowed to the extent indicated. The respondents — the State of Chhattisgarh through the Secretary, Department of Health Medical and Family Welfare, and the Director, Directorate of Health Medical and Family Welfare Department — were directed to examine the grievance of the petitioners and to take appropriate steps for framing suitable rules, amending the existing Recruitment Rules, 2013, or formulating an appropriate policy so as to provide a reasonable promotional avenue for the cadre of Ophthalmic Assistants. This exercise is to be completed within six months from the date of receipt of a certified copy of the order. No order as to costs was made.