VIGILANCE MANUAL VOLUME III - AP Online

DECISION - 72
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beyond its competence gave a status which it was
not entitled to give, ‘deconfirming’ him does not
amount to reduction in rank, so as to attract Art.
311(2) of Constitution.
(ii) An order rendered void on ground that the
authority making it lacked power, cannot give rise
to any legal right.
State of Punjab vs. Jagdip Singh,
AIR 1964 SC 521
The respondents were officiating Tahsildars in the erstwhile
State of PEPSU. By a notification of the Financial Commissioner,
they were confirmed as Tahsildars with immediate effect though no
posts were available. The successor State of Punjab reconsidered
the order and made a notification ‘deconfirming’ them. They
challenged the action on the ground that the action amounted to
reduction in rank violating Art. 311(2) of Constitution.
The Supreme Court observed that in the absence of any
rule which empowered the Financial Commissioner to create the post
of Tahsildars, his order had no legal foundation, there being no
vacancies in which the confirmation could take place and the order
was wholly void.
When an order is void on the ground that the authority which
made it had no power to make it, it cannot give rise to any legal
rights. Where a Government servant has no right to a post or to a
particular status though an authority under the Government acting
beyond its competence had purported to give that person a status
which it was not entitled to give, he will not in law he deemed to have
been validly appointed to the post which gives that particular status.
The use of the expression ‘deconfirming’ by the Government in its
notification may be susceptible of the meaning that it purported to
undo an act. Interpreted in the light of actual facts which led up to
the notification the order of confirmation of the Financial
Commissioner was no confirmation at all and thus invalid. Since the
respondents could not in law be regarded as holding that status and
their status