The Punjab and Haryana High Court has held that employees recruited through a private outsourcing agency and deployed with the PEPSU Road Transport Corporation (PRTC) cannot claim regularisation merely on the basis of their long service with the Corporation when they were never appointed by PRTC or given any employment status by it.A Division Bench of Justice Harsimran Singh Sethi and Justice Minderjeet Yadav made the ruling while allowing four appeals filed by PRTC against an April 22 order of a Single Judge directing regularisation of the services of employees working through an outsourcing agency. The Bench set aside the Single Judge’s order and dismissed the writ petitions.The Court noted that the employees had been working from day one through a private agency. The agency had advertised the posts and made the appointments, while the employees were deployed with PRTC to perform duties, including those of drivers and conductors.The employees had sought regularisation not under any policy of the Punjab Government, but by relying upon judicial precedents, including a case decided by the high court decided on September 3, 2025, whereby the services of an employee working continuously for 10 years was required to be regularised.The Single Judge noticed that the appointments had been made by the outsourcing agency, but treated PRTC as the employer for all intents and purposes and directed regularisation, besides other benefits, including the old pension scheme in cases where the employee had been working prior to January 1, 2004.The Division Bench first examined whether a master-servant relationship between PRTC and the respondents was necessary for seeking regularisation or could be accepted on a deemed basis. It held that such relationship had to be established through documentary evidence. “It is a settled principle of law that the master and servant relationship needs to be proved on the basis of written documents, including the appointment order etc.”The Bench was assisted in the matter by Advocate-General M S Bedi, PRTC standing counsel Abhilaksh Gaind, along with advocates Rakesh Roy, Hardeep Singh, Anupam Singla and L S Sidhu. Senior advocate Rajiv Pratap Atma Ram, along with advocates Arjun Pratap Atma Ram and Shreya Kaushik and Dr Sumati Jund, were also present along with PEPSU Legal Advisor Arvind Gupta.The Court found that the advertisements for recruitment had been issued by the private agency and that the appointment orders had also been issued by it. Their deployment with PRTC was pursuant to the manpower-supply contract between the PRTC and the outsourcing agency.“It is a conceded fact that there is no appointment order issued by the PRTC at any given point of time during the service career of the respondents, nor has any status, including temporary, ad hoc or officiating, been conferred upon them by the PRTC even up to now,” the Bench observed.The High Court further held that the appointment made by the private agency could not be treated as an appointment made by PRTC so as to burden the Corporation with the liability of regularising the workers. “In the present case, there being no written order at any given point of time appointing the respondents by the PRTC in any capacity and the appointment of private respondents have been made by the private outsourcing agency, which cannot be treated as an appointment made by the PRTC so as to burden the PRTC with the liability of regularising such employees in the service of PRTC,” the Bench observed.The Bench added they could not be said to have gained the status of PRTC employees so as to claim regularisation merely because they were discharging their duties with the PRTC after being appointed by a private agency. Such a proposition could not be accepted.The Bench added: “The benefit of such regularisation given to the contractual employees directly working with the PRTC, cannot be equated with an outsourced employee working with the PRTC through an outsourcing agency.”Concluding that the Single Judge’s order was not supported by the facts and law, the Bench set it aside and dismissed the writ petitions.