' EJAZ AFZAL KHAN, J.---These petitions for leave to appeal have arisen out of the judgment dated 19.01.2012 of the learned Federal Service Tribunal, Islamabad, whereby it dismissed the appeals filed by the petitioners.
2. Learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners contended that the learned Service Tribunal while disposing of the appeals filed by the petitioners did not consider the entire spectrum of the controversy and as such has failed to deliver a fair and just finding in this case. The learned counsel next contended that when the respondent was admittedly a temporary employee, he could not have been promoted to the next higher scale particularly when the petitioners being eligible by all means were side tracked by brushing aside all the recognized cannons of law and propriety. A finding thus handed down, the learned counsel added, cannot be maintained.
3. We have gone through the entire record carefully and considered the submissions of the learned counsel for the parties.
4. The record reveals that respondent was a temporary employee and he was working as such at the time he was promoted. Though his services were ex post facto regularized on 25.09.2008, yet at the relevant time he was an employee on contract to all intents and purposes. How could he rank senior and how he could be given preference over the employees who were regularized much earlier are the questions which have not been answered either in the impugned judgment or by the learned counsel for the respondents.
5. The learned AAG sought the dismissal of these petitions mainly on the ground of limitation but to our mind, it is not a case where the matter can be set at rest by invoking the provisions regulating the limitation. Whether the order promoting respondent No, 4 to the next higher scale could not be held to be free from the traits and trappings of a void order is a question which has deep bearing on the fate of the case. The learned Service Tribunal has not examined this question in its correct perspective. It has tried to draw a distinction between an illegal and void order but it appears to have taken {{INCOMPLETE}}