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The issue raised in these writ petitions being common, these cases are disposed of by this common judgment.

2. For convenience, I shall be referring to the facts as pleaded in WP(C) No.19008/07.

3. The petitioner joined the erstwhile Kerala Fisheries Corporation on contract basis as Assistant Engineer in their Deep Sea Trawlers w.e.f. 3/6/78. Eventually the Corporation fell into bad times and ultimately was wound up. Its assets were taken over by the 2nd respondent, the Kerala State Co-operative Federation for Fisheries Development Ltd (Matsyafed). Soon thereafter, the regular employees of the Corporation were offered voluntary retirement and those who opted to continue in service were absorbed in Matsyafed. However, in so far as contract employees like the petitioner are concerned, they were only allowed to continue as such.

The operative portion of the judgment reads as under:
In the result, I allow the original petition and there will be a direction to respondents 1 to 4 to regularise the service of the petitioners who are now in service of the Matsyafed in the respective categories within three months from the date of receipt of a copy of this judgment. From the above, it is therefore evident that the learned Judge directed regularisation of the petitioner within three months from the date of receipt of a copy of that judgment. The State did not file any appeal, but the Matsyafed preferred WA No.927/96. During the pendency of the writ appeal, the petitioner attained the age of superannuation and retired from service on 31/10/2003.

Despite Ext.P1 judgment thus attaining finality as per Ext.P2, orders regularizing the petitioner and similar employees were not issued and that led to the filing of COC No.1089/2006.

6. Apparently in view of the aforesaid proceedings, Ext.P3 order was issued by the State, making reference to the request of the Managing Director of Matsyafed to create 9 supernumerary posts in the cadre of Last Grade and 1 in the category of driver for accommodating 10 persons who were then continuing in service, WPC 16475, 19008, 19110 & 25984/07 presumably for the reason that the remaining of them had retired in the meanwhile. It is stated that this order was perused by this Court while considering the contempt case and not accepted as one in compliance with Exts.P1 and P2 and therefore the State issued Ext.P4 order directing that the 17 petitioners in the OP who were remaining in service of Matsyafed on 23/1/96 are eligible for regularisation in service w.e.f. 22/4/96 in the categories mentioned therein. In para 5 of the order, the regularisation ordered as above was made subject to the following terms and conditions.

8. I heard the counsel appearing for the Matsyafed and also the learned Government Pleader.

9. Both of them attempted to justify the aforesaid restrictive provision in the impugned orders making reference to the nature of employment, financial condition of Matsyafed and the belated proposal that was made by the Matsyafed before the Government.

10. In my view, none of these contentions arise for consideration in this writ petition nor are they relevant, for the following reasons.