Srinagar, Dec 29, KDC: The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), Srinagar Bench has declined to grant interim relief to the recently terminated employees of the Fire and Emergency Services Department after an Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) investigation found that their appointments were secured through a manipulated recruitment process in 2020. The tribunal’s decision follows an earlier interim order by the CAT Jammu Bench, which granted status quo protection on the posts held by similarly dismissed Firemen from the same recruitment batch.
According to news agency Kashmir Dot Com, the Srinagar Bench, comprising Member (A) Prasant Kumar and Member (J) Justice Ritu Tagore, while hearing a joint petition filed by 76 terminated Firemen and Fireman Drivers including recruits appointed as firemen and fireman drivers, through Senior Counsel R.A. Jan and Advocate Syed Yahaya, as per Kashmir dot Com, observed that an interim stay on the termination order could not be granted at this stage and issued notice to the Home Department, seeking a detailed reply. The government, through senior counsel Rais ud Din Ganaie, accepted notice and was granted six weeks to file its response, with the next hearing scheduled for 20 April 2026.
The terminated employees had sought a stay on Government Order No. 608 Home of 2025, dated 15 December 2025, under which 103 recruits were dismissed from service, arguing that their appointments in 2020 were made through a regular and formal selection process conducted by the Departmental Recruitment Board, and that they were being selectively invalidated despite being part of a larger group of 612 total selectees from the same batch. The ACB probe, which originated from the inquiry committee’s recommendations, had registered FIR No. 01/2025 on 02 January 2025, and subsequently submitted a preliminary verification report on 09 January 2025, followed by further investigation updates on 21 and 28 November 2025.
The Home Department’s termination order was based on the findings of the inquiry committee constituted on 12 December 2022, which had recommended a criminal investigation into allegations including question paper leakage, OMR sheet tampering, fabrication of scanned answer sheets, inflated marks and illegal manipulation of results and merit lists. The investigation found that 106 candidates were illegally favoured through inflated marks and manipulated results, of which three appointments had already been cancelled earlier for failure to complete mandatory service formalities, leaving the remaining 103 recruits, whose services were terminated under the latest Home Department order.
Meanwhile, the CAT Jammu Bench, comprising Member (A) Ram Mohan Johri and Member (J) Rajinder Singh Dogra, while hearing a related petition earlier filed by terminated employees from the Jammu division, through Advocate Bhatt Fayaz and N.D. Qazi, according to news agency Kashmir dot Com, had directed that status quo be maintained on the posts held by the terminated Firemen, preventing any replacements until the next date of hearing. The tribunal granted four weeks for filing the government reply and listed the matter for 27 January 2026, thereby temporarily freezing any coercive action or appointment of new candidates against those posts at the Jammu Bench level.
Both petitions before the tribunal stem from the recruitment process conducted between 2018 and 2020, initiated under Advertisement Notification No. 01 of 2013, dated 12 March 2013, followed later by Notification No. DF&ES/REC 2018/5908 18, dated 14 August 2018, and culminating in Appointment Order No. 823 of 2020, dated 04 October 2020, through which the recruits were inducted into the Fire and Emergency Services Department as Firemen and Fireman Drivers.
The tribunal in Srinagar noted that the government must be heard in detail before interim protection can be considered and therefore declined to stay the termination order, while allowing the main challenge to proceed for constitutional and administrative law scrutiny in the upcoming hearings. (KDC)
