The Supreme Court dismissed a writ petition by retired judicial officers re-employed as Presiding Officers of Central Government Industrial Tribunals who claimed pay parity with members of other tribunals. The Court held that persons appointed on re-employment after retirement cannot claim equality of pay with those appointed on regular service terms. The ruling clarifies that Article 14 does not guarantee identical pay across different appointment structures, even within the tribunal system.

This ruling sits at the intersection of Article 14 (equality before law) and service jurisprudence governing tribunals. The core constitutional doctrine tested here is the 'intelligible differentia' limb of the Article 14 equality test.

Article 14 prohibits arbitrary classification but permits reasonable classification if two conditions are met: (1) the classification must be founded on an intelligible differentia distinguishing persons or things grouped together from others left out, and (2) the differentia must have a rational nexus with the object the law seeks to achieve.

The Court applied this to distinguish between two categories of Presiding Officers: (a) those appointed on regular service terms, and (b) retired judges re-employed as Presiding Officers. The nature of appointment — regular versus re-employment post-retirement — constitutes a valid intelligible differentia. Re-employed officers already draw pension; their total emoluments are structurally different from those of regular appointees. Claiming pay parity by ignoring this structural difference would actually distort equality rather than achieve it.

This connects to the broader tribunal jurisprudence under Articles 323A and 323B (Administrative and other Tribunals), and the Supreme Court's consistent position that tribunals can have differentiated pay structures without violating Article 14, provided the classification is non-arbitrary.

For CLAT PG, the examiner is likely to test whether an aspirant can distinguish 'equality' from 'identity' — a classic Article 14 trap — and apply the two-pronged equality test to novel fact situations involving service law.