They cleared the exam for Deputy Superintendent of Police. The Air Force would not let them go

Bihar cancelled their candidature for failing to join in time. The Patna High Court holds the delay was beyond their control, sets the cancellations aside, and orders them taken on within thirty days.

A serving member of the armed forces who competes for a civil post faces a problem that has nothing to do with merit. He needs a No Objection Certificate to sit the examination, and a discharge to take up the post — and the second is not guaranteed by the first. If the Service declines to release him, he holds an appointment letter he cannot act on and a deadline he cannot meet.

On 23 September 2026 Justice Dr. Anshuman decided two connected writ petitions raising exactly that, and held that the State cannot treat the consequence as a voluntary refusal to join.

Two selections, and two refusals to release

Both petitioners were serving in the Indian Air Force. Each obtained a No Objection Certificate from the Air Force, appeared in the Bihar Public Service Commission’s combined competitive examination, completed the written stage and the interview, and was selected for appointment as Deputy Superintendent of Police in the Bihar Police Service.

Each then applied to the Air Force for discharge, and each was refused. In one case the refusal was on the footing that the NOC had been granted for a different purpose than the one now claimed. In the other, the request for an NOC and discharge certificate was rejected outright.

Both pursued the matter as far as they could. One of them litigated, and during the pendency of those proceedings the Delhi High Court directed the Air Force to reconsider his request, following which he was discharged. The other was discharged on 30 September 2025 on completion of the process. Both then went back to the Home Department (Police Branch), Government of Bihar, with their discharge orders and supporting documents, asking to be allowed to join.

The State refused. In one case the candidature had already been cancelled by a letter of 27 June 2022, which also recorded a decision to forward the vacancy to the next combined examination; a further application of 9 October 2025 and a reminder of 7 February 2026 were rejected by a letter of 27 February 2026. In the other, the refusals came by letters of 10 October 2022 and 5 March 2025.

The State relied on paragraphs 15 and 16 of Resolution No. 2374 dated 16 July 2007, which govern the consequence of failing to join within the stipulated time.

The question

The issue the Court identified was whether a failure to join, caused by continuing military service and the Air Force’s refusal to relieve the candidate, can be treated as voluntary non-joining.

It cannot. On the facts, the Court held that the delay in joining was beyond the control of the petitioners and that there was no deliberate lapse or negligence on their part. They had obtained the NOC before appearing, applied for discharge once selected, and pursued the requisite legal remedies to obtain their discharge certificates. Consequently, they could not be made to suffer for the period during which they were pursuing those remedies.

The Court therefore held that paragraphs 15 and 16 of the 2007 Resolution shall not operate as a bar against either petitioner in the peculiar facts and circumstances of these cases, and that the two departmental memos relied on by the State shall likewise not operate against them.

It is worth being precise about what that does and does not decide. The Court did not hold the Resolution invalid, or read an exception into it for armed forces personnel generally. It held that on facts where the impediment is another employer’s refusal and the candidate has done everything available to him, the bar does not apply. That is a fact-specific relief, and the judgment says so twice.

The orders set aside, and what follows

The impugned orders in both petitions — the letters of 27 February 2026 and 27 June 2022 in the first, and of 5 March 2025 and 10 October 2022 in the second — were held unsustainable and set aside.

The respondents were directed to accept the joining of both petitioners as Deputy Superintendent of Police within thirty days of receipt or production of a copy of the order, subject to verification of all requisite documents and fulfilment of other formal requirements.

Reinstated, but not backdated

The most carefully drawn paragraph is the one on consequential benefits, and it is where the relief stops short of what the petitioners would have wanted.

The Court made clear that they shall be treated as having joined from the date on which they actually submit their joining in compliance with the direction — not from the date they were originally required to join. Since they could not join earlier for reasons beyond their control, and their joining was prevented by the non-issuance of the discharge or NOC by their employer, they are entitled to salary and other admissible benefits from the date of their actual joining, in accordance with the applicable rules.

So they get the post and lose the seniority and pay of the intervening years — three years in one case and four in the other. The logic is consistent with the finding: the State was not at fault either. The obstruction came from a third party, the Air Force, which was not before the Court on these petitions, and the Bihar Government cannot be asked to pay for a period during which the petitioners were serving, and being paid by, another arm of the State.

The writ petitions were allowed with no order as to costs. Mr. Surendra Kumar Singh and Mr. Ranjeet Kumar Pandey appeared for the petitioners; Mr. S.D. Yadav, AAG-9, for the State; and Mr. Sanjay Pandey for the Bihar Public Service Commission.

The practical value of the judgment is for a recurring situation that the recruitment rules do not really contemplate. Governments encourage serving personnel to compete for civil posts and require an NOC for the purpose; nothing in that process guarantees a release at the end of it. Where the release is withheld and the candidate litigates for it, this judgment holds that the selecting State must keep its offer open and count the time lost as nobody’s fault — including its own.