Employee Cannot Withdraw Resignation After Accepting All Benefits, Supreme Court Holds

A two-judge bench rules that BOM ratification related back to cure unauthorised acceptance, and an employee who used his exit certificate to secure fresh employment cannot reclaim his old post.

The Supreme Court has dismissed attempts by a single employee to seek reinstatement in two public institutions simultaneously, holding that an employee who tenders his resignation, requests waiver of the notice period, collects his no-dues and experience certificates, and then uses those certificates to join another institution cannot later challenge the resignation as void on account of a technical defect in the accepting officer's authority. The bench of Justice Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha and Justice Alok Aradhe decided the consolidated appeals on 4 August 2026, addressing two overlapping questions: whether a Board of Management's subsequent ratification of an unauthorised acceptance of resignation cures that defect retrospectively, and whether a resigned employee retains any right to withdraw once the competent authority declines.

The judgment in Delhi Technological University v. B.S. Rawat, 2026 INSC 797, allowed DTU's appeal against a High Court of Delhi direction to reinstate respondent B.S. Rawat, dismissed Rawat's cross-appeal for back wages, and dismissed his Special Leave Petition challenging a Kerala High Court order that had already declined to reinstate him from the National Institute of Technology, Calicut.

How the Dispute Reached the Court

B.S. Rawat joined DTU as Assistant Registrar (Legal) on 23 August 2010. On 19 May 2016, he tendered his resignation to take effect from 1 September 2016, treating the intervening period as advance notice. He then went further: he requested that the notice period be waived and that his resignation be accepted with effect from 31 May 2016. Professor Yogesh Singh, who held only the additional charge of Vice-Chancellor at the time, accepted the resignation by a memo dated 25 May 2016. Rawat was relieved accordingly; his no-dues certificate, last pay certificate, and experience certificate were issued and accepted by him.

Nearly four months later, on 22 September 2016, Rawat wrote to DTU seeking to withdraw his resignation. He argued that the BOM, not Professor Yogesh Singh, was the competent authority to accept resignations under Section 23(2)(ix) of the Delhi Technological University Act, 2009. The BOM's 20th meeting, held on 26 September 2016, ratified the acceptance of the resignation. By an order dated 3 November 2016, DTU rejected the withdrawal request.

Meanwhile, Rawat had already joined NIT Calicut as Deputy Registrar on 8 February 2017, using the experience certificate DTU had issued. He later resigned from NIT Calicut as well, conditionally at first, then unconditionally, while reserving a right to withdraw before actual relieving. NIT Calicut accepted that resignation on 22 November 2018. On 28 November 2018, Rawat sought to withdraw, having been selected on deputation with the East Delhi Municipal Corporation. NIT Calicut rejected the withdrawal by an order dated 7 January 2019, and relieved him on 11 January 2019.

The Delhi High Court's Single Judge, and on appeal the Division Bench, ordered reinstatement in DTU, though the Division Bench denied back wages on account of his gainful employment in the interregnum. The Kerala High Court's Division Bench, reversing a Single Judge in NIT Calicut's favour, declined reinstatement there as well. Both sets of proceedings came before the Supreme Court together.

Competent Authority and the Ratification Question at DTU

The Court accepted, in agreement with both High Courts, that Section 23(2)(ix) of the 2009 Act vests in the BOM the power to appoint persons to teaching, administrative, and ministerial posts, and that this power equally encompasses the acceptance of resignations from such posts. Professor Yogesh Singh, holding only additional charge of Vice-Chancellor, was not the competent authority. The BOM had not validly delegated its powers to him for this purpose. To that extent, the Court found no error in the High Court's reasoning.

The central question, however, was what followed from that finding. The Court held that the Division Bench had failed to apply the correct legal principle when it ignored the effect of the BOM's ratification on 26 September 2016.

The judgment sets out the doctrine of ratification in terms drawn from the maxim ratihabitio mandato aequiparatur — a subsequent ratification is equivalent to a prior command — and its elaboration in omnis ratihabitio retrotrahitur et mandato priori aequiparatur, which imports retrospective effect: a ratified act is deemed valid from the date of the original, unauthorised act, not merely from the date of ratification. The Court identified six principles from its prior decisions:

• Ratification makes a previously invalid act valid and is treated as equivalent to prior authority.
• It operates retrospectively, relating back to the date of the original act.
• Only the competent authority can ratify; the authority legally empowered to perform the act must itself approve the earlier unauthorised action.
• Express approval of the earlier action is sufficient; a fresh order need not be passed.
• Ratification cures defects of authority, not acts that are inherently illegal or beyond the power of any authority.

The BOM, which was the competent authority, ratified the acceptance at its meeting on 26 September 2016. That ratification, the Court held, related back to 25 May 2016, the date on which the in-charge Vice-Chancellor had accepted the resignation. By 22 September 2016, when Rawat sought to withdraw, there was, in law, no resignation left in existence that could be withdrawn.

Approbation and Reprobation: Rawat's Own Conduct

The Court went further, holding that even apart from ratification, the principle against approbation and reprobation independently precluded Rawat's challenge. It was Rawat who initiated the resignation, who requested the notice period be waived, who asked for an earlier effective date, who accepted the no-dues certificate, the last pay certificate, and the experience certificate, and who then used that experience certificate to secure the appointment at NIT Calicut.

The Court observed that “every step that rendered the resignation complete in fact was taken either at the respondent's own instance or with his express concurrence.” The defect — that the accepting officer held only additional charge — was an internal administrative matter of which Rawat was not even aware and did not complain of until four months after he had been relieved and had taken up fresh employment.

Relying on a principle traced to the House of Lords in Reichel v. Bishop of Oxford, (1889) 14 AC 259, as noted by this Court in Union of India v. Gopal Chandra Misra, the bench held that a resignee who has done all that lay in his power to complete a transaction, and has taken the full benefit of it, cannot later be permitted to upset it merely because formal acceptance by the competent authority was still outstanding. Rawat could not claim the benefits of a completed exit from DTU when it suited him to move on, and simultaneously claim that no exit had legally occurred when it suited him to return.

Resignation at NIT Calicut: Effectiveness and Right of Withdrawal

Rawat's challenge to his separation from NIT Calicut raised four arguments: that acceptance had not been communicated to him; that he had an unqualified right to withdraw before being relieved; that the refusal was arbitrary; and that acceptance, being conditioned on a notice period, was merely prospective. The Court rejected all four.

The proviso to Statute 30 of the NIT First Statutes, 2009, states that a resignation “shall take effect only on the date on which the resignation is accepted by the appointing authority.” The Court read this to mean that acceptance, not its communication, determines effectiveness, and that the notice period thereafter regulates only the date of actual relieving, not the legal effect of acceptance. The resignation became effective on 22 November 2018 when it was accepted. Rawat's letter of 28 November 2018 seeking withdrawal was addressed after the resignation had already taken legal effect. Non-communication of an acceptance that has in fact been made does not keep the resignation alive for withdrawal. The Court found this position consistent with Raj Kumar v. Union of India, AIR 1969 SC 180.

On the right to withdraw, the Court noted that paragraph 3 of the Office Memorandum dated 11 February 1988, while recognising withdrawal of an accepted resignation before actual relieving as the normal rule, expressly preserves to the competent authority the discretion to refuse, subject to reasons being recorded and communicated. That discretion was exercised here by order dated 7 January 2019. Rawat's own resignation letter recorded that he was not interested in continuing at the Institute; his request for withdrawal came immediately upon his selection for deputation with the East Delhi Municipal Corporation, and was, on its own terms, confined to enabling him to join that Corporation.

The Court held that NIT Calicut's conclusion — that Rawat had no genuine intention of continuing in service and that the withdrawal request was opportunistic — was a plausible and rational view. A court exercising jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution is not entitled to substitute its own assessment of the sufficiency of such reasons in the absence of mala fides, perversity, or a demonstrated violation of law. The Court also rejected Rawat's reliance on Gopal Chandra Misra and Air India Express Ltd. v. Captain Gurdarshan Kaur Sandhu, observing that both decisions recognise that the general right to withdraw a prospective resignation yields wherever a special statutory or regulatory provision governs the subject — precisely the situation presented by Statute 30 and the Office Memorandum.

Outcome

Civil Appeal No. 9308 of 2024, filed by DTU, is allowed. The judgment of the Division Bench of the High Court of Delhi dated 8 August 2022 in L.P.A. No. 68 of 2022, insofar as it directed reinstatement of B.S. Rawat, is set aside. W.P.(C) No. 2611 of 2019 stands dismissed.

Civil Appeal No. 9309 of 2024, filed by B.S. Rawat seeking back wages, is dismissed.

Special Leave Petition (C) Nos. 625–626 of 2021, filed by B.S. Rawat against NIT Calicut, is dismissed.

There is no order as to costs. Pending applications, if any, stand disposed of.