ISLAMABAD:
The Supreme Court has ruled that government departments must avoid unnecessary litigation in service matters, stressing that public authorities should resolve employees’ grievances internally in accordance with settled law instead of allowing disputes to repeatedly return to the courts.
“A government department must not function as a compulsive litigant, allowing institutional passivity to repeatedly drag settled controversies back into the courts, leaving civil servants in prolonged uncertainty while wasting public funds and consuming precious judicial time over issues already resolved,” says a seven-page judgment authored by Justice Ayesha Malik.
The Supreme Court division bench, led by Justice Ayesha Malik, set aside a Federal Service Tribunal decision concerning the promotion of Pakistan Railways employees.
The judgment observed that, as a public authority and state institution, the Railways department was expected to act as a model employer toward its officers.
Service jurisprudence required public employers to conduct their internal affairs with probity and administrative responsibility, ensuring that settled service conditions remained stable and were not undermined by administrative indecision.
The court said that a corresponding responsibility rested on civil servants themselves.
As state officers entrusted with public responsibilities, they were expected to demonstrate selflessness, administrative restraint and institutional loyalty, giving priority to the public interest rather than exploiting administrative uncertainty for personal gain.
It observed that employees who entered service, completed probation and advanced through regular promotions under an established departmental practice could not seek to overturn that framework at a later stage merely because a different interpretation of the rules offered them a personal advantage.
“The pursuit of personal ambition must always remain subordinate to the overarching duty owed to the State,” the judgment stated, adding that civil servants had a responsibility to preserve the stability, predictability and operational harmony of state institutions.
The court noted that the prolonged dispute between administrative practice and statutory probation rules originated from the Railways department’s longstanding reliance on merit in the Central Superior Services (CSS) examination at the time of initial induction.
That approach developed into an established departmental practice governing seniority over several decades and was also recognised by the Supreme Court, according to the judgment.
The court said the history of the dispute highlighted a fundamental requirement of good governance: public institutions must learn from recurring litigation and develop a culture of administrative finality.
Where an administrative practice had repeatedly been tested and upheld by the courts, a responsible public authority was required to apply the settled legal position internally rather than treating every representation as a fresh controversy.
The judgment observed that the railways had been fully aware that its longstanding practice, based on CSS examination merit, had received judicial affirmation. It was therefore under a positive administrative obligation to decide the employees’ representations in accordance with the law.
“Instead, it sat in silence and failed to decide the representations,” the court said.
By failing to resolve the departmental appeal on established legal principles, the department encouraged avoidable litigation and forced the courts to reconsider a controversy that should have been laid to rest, it added.
The judgment emphasised that timely internal resolution of service grievances was essential not only to protect employees from prolonged uncertainty but also to prevent the waste of public funds and judicial resources. Public authorities, it said, should exercise proactive leadership and settle disputes administratively when the applicable legal position was already clear.
The court underscored that both government departments and civil servants had institutional responsibilities: departments must act consistently with settled law, while employees must respect established service frameworks and place public interest above individual advantage.
