The Supreme Court has reaffirmed that an illegal appointment cannot acquire legality simply because the employee continued in service for a long duration. The Court ruled that time alone cannot regularise what was void from inception. Prolonged continuance in an illegally obtained post does not create a vested right to regularisation. The ruling reinforces that public employment must follow constitutional and statutory procedures, and sympathy cannot override the rule of law in matters of irregular government appointments.

This ruling operationalises a well-settled constitutional doctrine at the intersection of Article 14 (equality before law) and public employment law. The Supreme Court has consistently held — starting from State of Mysore v. S.V. Narayanappa (1967) and reinforced decisively in Secretary, State of Karnataka v. Umadevi (2006) — that regularisation of illegal appointments violates Article 14 because it creates an unfair back-door entry into public service, bypassing eligible candidates who followed due process.

The Umadevi Constitution Bench (5-judge) is the landmark anchor here. It held: (1) temporary or daily-wage employees engaged without following proper procedure cannot claim regularisation as a right; (2) the passage of time does not legalise an illegal appointment; (3) only a one-time regularisation under a valid scheme by the government, for those who had served for ten or more years without court orders or judicial intervention, was permissible. This ruling closed the door on routine regularisation claims.

The current ruling reaffirms Umadevi's ratio. The constitutional test applied is whether the appointment process conformed to Articles 14 and 16 (equality of opportunity in public employment). If it did not, no subsequent fact — including long service — can cure the original illegality. This is rooted in the principle that 'what is void ab initio remains void'; courts cannot validate what the Constitution prohibits. The examiner tests whether aspirants can distinguish valid compassionate appointments, one-time regularisation schemes, and void ab initio appointments under this framework.