They Did The Department's Work For Decades. Now They Are Its Employees.
Goa's Public Works Department took the labour of these workmen for years, gave them temporary status in 2014, and then said no to absorption. The Supreme Court has directed regularisation.
The Court set aside the High Court's judgment and held the appellants entitled to regularisation of their services in the Public Works Department, in the posts and categories assigned to them by the State's own categorisation exercise. Having taken the benefit of their labour for so long, the State could not deny them regularisation on the ground of an initial procedural infirmity for which they bore no responsibility.
- The State's own order of 2014 gave them temporary status and recognised their right to be absorbed as vacancies arose.
- Umadevi is not a wall. Paragraph 53 of it contemplates a one-time measure for irregular, as distinct from illegal, appointments continued ten years or more.
- Irregular is not the same as illegal, and the distinction is what decides these cases.
- Refusing them was itself the exploitation the labour society had been set up to prevent.
- Court
- Supreme Court of India
- Bench
- Justice Sanjay Karol, Justice N Kotiswar Singh
- Citation
- 2026 INSC 792
- Reported
- [2026] 8 S.C.R. 431
- Case
- Civil Appeal No. 13055 of 2025
- Decided
- 4 August 2026
- Outcome
- Appeal allowed; regularisation directed
Who the workers were
They were engaged between 1967 and 2003 through private contractors. To stop the exploitation of contract labour by intermediaries, the State set up the PWD Labour Supply Society, and they became its members.
On 7 February 2014 the Principal Chief Engineer granted them temporary status and recognised their entitlement to be absorbed in the establishment of the PWD as and when vacancies arose.
The High Court, by a judgment of 28 July 2023, declined to give effect to that order.
Why the Supreme Court disagreed
More than a decade had passed since the 2014 order. Through it the appellants continued to serve in PWD establishments, doing duties indistinguishable from those of regularly appointed employees.
That continued need was itself the surest indicator that their services were, and remained, required by the State.
To deny regularisation at this distance of time, on the ground of a procedural infirmity in the original engagement for which they bore no responsibility, would be manifestly unfair.
What Umadevi actually says
The Constitution Bench in State of Karnataka v. Umadevi struck a balance between equality of opportunity in public employment and the practice of backdoor entry.
But the Court has repeatedly cautioned against a mechanical invocation of Umadevi to defeat the claims of long-serving employees doing essential and perennial work; and in District Bar Association, Bandipora it held that Umadevi does not stop the State from framing a regularisation scheme at all.
Paragraph 53 of Umadevi itself recognises a one-time measure for duly qualified persons in irregular appointments continued for ten years or more without a court order. This case fell squarely within it.
Who argued it
Appearances as recorded in the judgment of the Court.
Frequently asked
Does Umadevi bar regularisation of contract workers?
No. The Supreme Court held that paragraph 53 of Umadevi itself contemplates a one-time regularisation of irregular appointments continued for ten years or more.
What did the workers get?
Regularisation in the Public Works Department in the posts and categories assigned to them under the State's categorisation.
Building a regularisation claim for long-service workers
- Find the State's own recognition — an order granting temporary status is worth more than years of argument.
- Show the work is perennial and identical to that of regular employees, post by post.
- Plead paragraph 53 of Umadevi expressly, and show ten years of continuous service without an enabling court order.
- Separate irregular from illegal at the outset; the whole case turns on which side of that line you are on.
Source. Supreme Court of India, 2026 INSC 792, [2026] 8 S.C.R. 431, Civil Appeal No. 13055 of 2025, decided 4 August 2026 by Justice Sanjay Karol, Justice N Kotiswar Singh. This explainer is written from the judgment text as reported.
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