New Delhi: The Delhi High Court has dismissed a petition filed by a woman seeking 10 years’ age relaxation for appointment as a Primary Teacher in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), holding that an age-relaxation notification applicable to Delhi government schools could not automatically be extended to recruitment governed by the MCD’s separate Recruitment Rules.
Also Watch:
A Division Bench of Justice Anil Khetarpal and Justice Bharat Parashar, in a judgment pronounced on October 1, upheld the Central Administrative Tribunal’s order rejecting the petitioner’s claim.
The petitioner had challenged the Tribunal’s December 18, 2025 order dismissing her application seeking age relaxation and consequential appointment to the post of Teacher (Primary), Post Code 01/18, in the MCD.
She was represented by advocates Ashok Agarwal, Kumar Utkarsh, Ashna Khan and Manoj Kumar, while the Delhi government was represented by Standing Counsel Anand Prakash along with advocate Varsha Arya.
Petitioner Poonam Patwal, who was born on April 27, 1982, claimed that she had been working as a Guest Teacher with the Directorate of Education since 2012. Her claim was based on a November 1, 1980 notification issued by the Directorate of Education under Rule 43 of the Delhi School Education Rules, 1973, which provided a general 10-year relaxation in the maximum age limit prescribed for recruitment to various teaching posts for women candidates.
The Recruitment Rules applicable to MCD Primary Teachers, however, prescribed an upper age limit of 30 years for direct recruitment. DSSSB’s June 26, 2018 Advertisement No. 01/18, issued for 4,366 vacancies, retained the 30-year upper age limit and specified the relaxations available to different categories.
The petitioner had earlier approached the Tribunal and obtained an interim order permitting her to participate in the selection process. She subsequently appeared in the written examination held in October 2018 and secured 123.01 marks, against an Unreserved-category cut-off of 117.52 marks. She was also shortlisted for uploading her e-dossier.
The 1980 notification was eventually withdrawn on March 6, 2020. The petitioner argued that since the notification was still in force when the 2018 recruitment advertisement was issued, its subsequent withdrawal could not retrospectively deprive her of the claimed benefit. She also argued that she had scored higher than the last selected candidate in the Unreserved category.
The High Court, however, held that the central issue was not merely whether the 1980 notification was formally withdrawn in 2020, but whether it was applicable to recruitment for an MCD post governed by separate Recruitment Rules prescribing a 30-year age limit.
The Bench noted that MCD is an autonomous local body governed by its own statutory framework and service conditions. Importantly, the petitioner could not show that the 1980 notification had ever been adopted by the MCD or incorporated into the Recruitment Rules governing the post of Primary Teacher.
The Court further observed that Advertisement No. 01/18 itself did not contain any provision extending the 10-year relaxation under the 1980 notification to candidates seeking appointment to MCD posts. According to the Bench, the petitioner was effectively seeking to import an age relaxation from a different regulatory framework into the MCD recruitment process.
The Bench also relied upon the Supreme Court’s judgment in Delhi Subordinate Services Selection Board v. Seema Kapoor, holding that an age relaxation applicable to a particular class of candidates or recruitment cannot be expanded beyond the language of the provision granting such relaxation. The Court noted that the existence of an administrative relationship or the status of an establishment as a local or autonomous body does not by itself enlarge the class entitled to an age concession.
The High Court also rejected the argument that the petitioner’s participation in the examination and her securing 123.01 marks created an entitlement to appointment. It said participation pursuant to an interim order does not create a substantive right to appointment, and merit can operate only among candidates who satisfy the prescribed eligibility conditions.
The Bench distinguished other Delhi High Court decisions relied upon by the petitioner, including Satish Kumar Meena and Neetu Kumari, observing that those cases involved recruitment notices that expressly extended age concessions to employees of the GNCTD and its local and autonomous bodies. No comparable provision was shown in the present MCD recruitment advertisement.
The Court also rejected the petitioner’s contention that her work as a Guest Teacher with the Directorate of Education, and the alleged feeder relationship between the MCD Primary Teacher post and the TGT post in the DoE, could make the two services equivalent for the purpose of age relaxation.
It further held that the existence of vacancies or an alleged shortage of Primary Teachers could not confer eligibility upon a candidate when the prescribed recruitment rules did not permit the appointment.
“Consequently, the challenge to the Impugned Order dated 18.12.2025 fails,” the Bench held, concluding that the Tribunal had correctly declined to extend the 1980 age relaxation to the MCD recruitment. The writ petition, along with the pending applications, was accordingly dismissed.
(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by FPJ's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)
