Tripura HC Dismisses Writ of Contractual PIO Seeking Re-engagement in IGDC CREFLAT Project
The High Court of Tripura held that a contractual Project Implementing Officer engaged through an outsourcing agency had no enforceable right to re-engagement or regularisation after her tenure ended in September 2025.
Justice Biswajit Palit, sitting singly at the High Court of Tripura, Agartala, dismissed a writ petition filed by Dr. Reema Saha, a contractual Project Implementing Officer (PIO) who had been engaged through the Society for Entrepreneurship Development (SOFED) for deployment in the Indo-German Development Cooperation (IGDC) CREFLAT Project. Dr. Saha challenged the curtailment of her engagement to 25 September 2025 and a subsequent recruitment notification issued by SOFED on 5 November 2025 for the same post. The court found that her appointment was purely contractual and routed through an outsourcing agency, that her performance had been unsatisfactory, and that no legal basis existed to direct her re-engagement or to quash the fresh recruitment notification.
The Dispute Before the High Court
Dr. Saha was initially appointed as PIO by SOFED on 10 February 2021 on a contract basis for eleven months, for deployment in the IGDC CREFLAT Project run under the Directorate of Industries & Commerce, Government of Tripura. Her engagement was extended on multiple occasions. The CEO & Project Director of IGDC CREFLAT issued a certificate of accreditation in her favour, and the Director of the NTFP Centre of Excellence, Tripura JICA Project, also issued a performance certificate.
By an office order dated 14 May 2025, the petitioner was assigned monitoring duties across five sub-divisions. However, by a subsequent office order dated 28 August 2025, those duties were reassigned to Dr. Biplab Brahma (STO-MIS). SOFED then extended her engagement only from 8 September 2025 to 25 September 2025 — a period of seventeen days — without assigning reasons. On 5 November 2025, SOFED issued Recruitment Notification No.05/2025-26 advertising the PIO post afresh. These two actions prompted Dr. Saha to file WP(C) No.660 of 2025.
Through the writ petition, she sought directions to re-appoint her as PIO for the remaining life of the CREFLAT project, to renew her tenure from 25 September 2025 until regularisation of her service or the end of the project (whichever was earlier), and to quash the recruitment notification insofar as it related to the PIO post.
The Respondents’ Position
The State respondents and the project authority filed separate counter-affidavits. Respondents 5, 7 and 8 — the CEO & Project Director and associated officers of IGDC CREFLAT — denied that any employer-employee relationship existed between the petitioner and the project authority. They stated that SOFED had engaged her as an outsourced contractual worker, and all extensions were SOFED’s internal administrative decisions.
On performance, the counter-affidavit was specific. It stated that Dr. Saha had not submitted monthly work reports, had not regularly visited the field despite being assigned monitoring duties across multiple sub-divisions, had not produced activity monitoring reports, and had failed to follow up on regular monthly review meetings. The project authority characterised these as persistent failures in a senior operational role that posed a risk to the externally aided project’s timelines. The reassignment of duties to Dr. Biplab Brahma was described as a bona fide administrative decision taken to protect project outputs.
The Additional Government Advocate, Mr. Dipankar Sarma, also drew the court’s attention to Annexure-R/4, which he said showed that the petitioner had “polluted the environment at the time of discharging her job.” He submitted that while an inquiry had found those allegations baseless, the engagement was for a fixed contractual period and the Supreme Court judgments cited by the petitioner were inapplicable because they concerned regular and ad hoc employees, not outsourced contractual workers.
The Legal Arguments and Precedents Cited
Senior Counsel Mr. Purusuttam Roy Barman, assisted by Mr. Kawsik Nath, relied on three Supreme Court decisions to argue that the petitioner could not be displaced mid-project.
The first was Mohd. Abdul Kadir and Another v. Director General of Police, Assam, (2009) 6 SCC 611, where the Supreme Court held that ad hoc appointments under a scheme are normally coterminous with the scheme, and that employees appointed under a scheme through a selection process need not be subjected to annual termination and re-engagement merely because their appointments are termed ad hoc.
The second was Hargurpratap Singh v. State of Punjab and Others, (2007) 13 SCC 292, where the Supreme Court directed that ad hoc employees should be continued until regular incumbents are appointed and should receive the minimum of the pay scale.
The third was U.P. Junior High School Council Instructor Welfare Association v. State of Uttar Pradesh & Ors., 2026 SCC OnLine SC 147, where the Supreme Court observed that a contractual employee cannot be replaced by another contractual employee, and that incumbents working in such capacities are entitled to preference over fresh candidates unless there is something against them.
The petitioner also pointed to Clause 2.7.2 of the Project Operation Manual, which stated that continuity of project staff until completion of the project period was a “very crucial requirement” for successful implementation, particularly for critical positions like PIO, and that disengagement could only follow long unauthorised absence or serious misconduct after following principles of natural justice.
How the Court Reasoned
Justice Palit began by noting the precise nature of the petitioner’s case: she was not contending that her service had been discontinued on grounds of misconduct or misbehaviour. Her case was that despite having the requisite qualification, the respondents had illegally discontinued her engagement.
The court then examined the Supreme Court’s more recent pronouncements on contractual and outsourced employment. It relied on Municipal Council, Nandyal Municipality v. K. Jayaram and Others (SLP (Civil) Nos.17711-17713 of 2019), where the Supreme Court held that an outsourced worker engaged through a third-party contractor has no direct employer-employee relationship with the principal body, and any claim lies against the contractor rather than the principal. The Supreme Court in that case had also observed that the test is whether the relationship between the two contesting parties is direct or mediated through a third party.
The court also drew on Sunil Kumar Yadav and Others v. State of Jharkhand and Others, 2026 SCC OnLine SC 818, which reiterated that contractual employees have no automatic right to regularisation, absorption, permanency, or pay parity. They have only a right to participate and be considered under applicable statutory recruitment rules. The Supreme Court in that case had also affirmed that a scheme post cannot be converted into a cadre post by judicial direction, as that would create a new mode of recruitment not sanctioned by law and contrary to the binding precedent in Secretary, State of Karnataka v. Uma Devi, (2006) 4 SCC 1.
From these decisions, Justice Palit drew two propositions. First, contractual employees have no automatic right to regularisation, absorption, or permanency. Second, an outsourced worker cannot claim the status of a regular employee or equal service benefits against a government body unless direct employment or a sham contract is proved.
Applying these to the facts, the court found that Dr. Saha had been engaged by SOFED, an outsourcing agency, from 10 February 2021 on an eleven-month contract, with extensions granted from time to time, the last of which ran only to 25 September 2025. The counter-affidavit material showed that her performance was unsatisfactory. The petitioner’s senior counsel, while citing precedents, could not place any material before the court to show that SOFED had no authority to discontinue her engagement or that the discontinuance was illegal.
On the three Supreme Court judgments cited by the petitioner, the court held that they could not be applied to her case. The Mohd. Abdul Kadir and Hargurpratap Singh decisions concerned ad hoc employees with a direct relationship with the appointing authority, not outsourced contractual workers engaged through an intermediary agency. The U.P. Junior High School decision, while stating that a contractual employee cannot be replaced by another contractual employee, arose in a different factual matrix and did not override the settled position that outsourced workers have no enforceable right against the principal body.
Outcome
Justice Biswajit Palit dismissed WP(C) No.660 of 2025, finding it bereft of merit. The court held that the petitioner had failed to show any extant rule or legal basis on which a direction could be issued to the respondents to absorb her in the post she had held prior to her discontinuance. No irregularity or illegality was found in the proceedings of the respondent authorities. Any interim order passed earlier in the matter was vacated, and all pending applications were disposed of.