Doing a Higher Post's Work Does Not Automatically Mean Higher Pay

Imagine you joined an office as a junior assistant. Over the years, your senior retired, no one was posted in their place, and quietly you began doing all of that senior's work - the files, the approvals, the supervision. Years pass. You are still drawing your old salary while carrying a much heavier post's responsibilities. One day you ask a simple question: if I am doing the higher post's job, am I not entitled to the higher post's pay? A recent Delhi High Court ruling gives an answer many employees will not like to hear.

The line the courts draw is between a formal, sanctioned arrangement and an informal, verbal instruction to do more work. The table below shows which side of the line usually wins.

The pattern is simple: paper wins. If there is a sanctioned order behind the extra work, a pay claim can stand. If there is only an informal instruction, courts have repeatedly refused to convert it into a pay entitlement.

In the Tejinder Kaur case, an employee substantively appointed as a Research Assistant claimed she had discharged the functions of a Deputy Director - a higher cadre post - and was therefore entitled to that post's pay and benefits. The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) had accepted her plea and directed payment. On appeal, the Division Bench of Justices C. Hari Shankar and Om Prakash Shukla set that order aside.

The Bench held that even if an employer makes a person do the work of a higher post, that by itself does not entitle the person to the pay of the higher post, in the absence of any formal order of appointment or promotion to it. Being asked to shoulder higher duties is not the same as being appointed to the higher post. The Court also held that the principle of equal pay for equal work could not rescue the claim, because that principle demands strict proof of near-identical functions, responsibilities and accountability - and the burden of that proof lies heavily on the employee. General praise for good performance, or handling a few projects, does not establish functional equivalence to the higher post.

This does not mean “equal pay for equal work” is dead. That principle still protects similarly-placed employees who genuinely do the same work but are paid unequally. What the Court rejected was using it as a shortcut to leapfrog into a higher post's scale without ever being appointed to that post.

A related but different rule: the site also covers how a compassionate appointment gives no claim to a higher post. That is a separate principle - it is about how you entered service, not about doing higher duties. Keep the two apart: one is about the basis of appointment, the other is about officiating in a higher role.

If you are doing a senior's job without a promotion, you are not powerless. You just have to move the claim onto paper and into the service-rule framework instead of relying on the fact that you did the work.

1. Ask for an officiating or current-duty-charge order. Put in a written request to be formally given charge of the higher post. A charge order, not the workload, is what triggers charge allowance.
2. Ask for a charge allowance. Many service rules sanction an allowance when an employee holds full additional charge of a higher post. Request it in writing and cite the rule.
3. Push for a formal promotion or ad-hoc appointment. If a sanctioned higher post is lying vacant and you are eligible, seek a proper appointment order through the DPC or ad-hoc route.
4. Use RTI to get the paperwork. File an RTI for the sanctioned strength of the higher post, the office order under which you were given the extra duties, and the rules or policy on officiating pay and charge allowance. This tells you whether any sanction exists in your favour.
5. Draft it cleanly. You can use the AI RTI drafter to frame these questions, and browse the other RTI tools for filing help. For the wider strategy of pinning down what a department must record and disclose, read The RTI Playbook.

An RTI reply that shows no officiating order and no charge sanction tells you the honest position early - so you press for a formal order going forward, rather than assuming past workload has already earned you the higher scale.

Not on the strength of the workload alone. Without a formal appointment, officiating order or sanctioned charge allowance for that period, courts have declined to grant the higher post's pay as arrears. The Delhi High Court in the Tejinder Kaur case set aside exactly such a direction.

It helps only if you can give strict proof that your post, functions and responsibilities are genuinely identical to the higher post - the burden is heavy and lies on you. It cannot be used simply to move you into a higher post's scale when you were never appointed to that post.

A charge allowance is a smaller, rule-based payment sanctioned when you formally hold additional charge of a higher post. It is not the higher post's full pay scale. It exists precisely because doing extra duties, on its own, does not convert into the higher salary.

Often, yes - within reason and for a limited period - unless your service rules provide otherwise. The remedy is to seek a formal officiating order or charge allowance, not to assume the pay follows the duties automatically.

RTI lets you obtain the office order behind your extra duties, the sanctioned strength of the higher post, and the department's officiating/charge-allowance policy. These documents show whether any sanction supports your claim, which is far stronger than relying on the fact that you did the work.

• LiveLaw - Discharging Duties Of Higher Post Doesn't Entitle Employee To Higher Pay Without Formal Appointment: Delhi High Court
• Verdictum - NIPCCD v. Tejinder Kaur, 2026:DHC:5210-DB

This article explains a general legal principle and is not a substitute for advice on your specific service conditions. Check your own recruitment and pay rules.