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3. The facts lie in a narrow compass. One Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra was working as an Associate Professor in Law in the Respondent-University. On 27.11.2015, the Executive Council of the Respondent-University granted a lien for one year to Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra to enable him to join the post of Associate Professor in Law in Sikkim University. On 02.12.2015, Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra joined Sikkim University.

4. On 05.05.2016, the Respondent-University issued an advertisement through an employment notification for various posts by inviting applications from suitable candidates. In the Department of Law, for the post of Assistant Professor, three vacancies were advertised. One was an unreserved regular vacancy. One was a lien vacancy in the Open category and one was a lien vacancy for the OBC candidates. The pay-scale was Rs.15600-39100 and the Grade Pay was Rs.6,000/-. In the note appended in Clause 19, it was mentioned “Appointment made to the posts against LIEN vacancy are likely to be regularized subject to vacation of lien and satisfactory performance.” Importantly, it was a common advertisement for all the three vacancies. We say this, at the outset, because both the learned Single Judge and the Division Bench proceeded on the basis that what was advertised was only a lien vacancy. No doubt, two of the vacancies were lien vacancies. However, there was one regular post also notified in the Unreserved category and hence it will be too much to assume that candidates would not have applied in full measure on the premise that only lien vacancies were advertised.

2. Your appointment is against Lien vacancy and hence liable to be terminated with the joining of the incumbent concerned back to the substantive post held by him in this University. In case the lien is vacated, your service may be continued further with the approval of the Executive Council of the University.”

9. To summarize, the appointment order mentioned that a) the appointment was against the lien vacancy; b) it was liable to be terminated with the joining of the incumbent concerned back to the substantive post and c) in case the lien is vacated, the Appellant’s service may be continued further with the approval of the Executive Council of the University.

10. The Appellant, after resigning her job from the Tripura Government Law College, joined the University in the post of Assistant Professor in Law with effect from 17.01.2017 (F/N) and has been continuously working for the last seven years and six months.

11. On 08.03.2017, the lien granted to Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra was extended by six months with effect from 15.12.2016. When the matter stood thus, in the 29th Meeting of the Executive Council of the University held on 14.11.2017 vide Agenda 12/29/2017, the resignation tendered by Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra vide letter dated 18.09.2017 from the post of Assistant Professor, Department of Law, Tripura University was accepted. The situation then was that Dr. Praveen Kumar Mishra, who held the lien, forfeited any lien that may have existed. Ordinarily, by virtue of Note 19 of the employment notice, the Appellant was expecting her regularization since there was nothing adverse in her performance. However, that was not to be.

26. The Appellant went through the normal process of selection. The employment notice set out that appointments made to the posts against LIEN vacancies are likely to be regularized subject to vacation of lien and satisfactory performance. The lien admittedly got vacated. The performance has been satisfactory as nothing adverse had been pointed out and the Appellant is discharging the duties for more than seven years. While approving the panel of names also it was clearly mentioned that in case the candidate at Serial No.1 – Sri. Brij Mohan Pandey did not accept the offer, the Appellant was to be accommodated against the regular vacancy. This clearly demonstrates that all the applicants competed for the regular post also and no one from the open market could have been prejudiced. Most importantly, the offer of appointment also stated that in case the lien was vacated, the Appellant’s service was to be continued further with the approval of the Executive Council of the University.