I. S. Tiwana, J. - (1.)The petitioner, who at the time of filing of this petition, was working as a Superintendent in the Head Office of the Food and Supplies Department, Punjab, impugns the promotion of respondent No. 3, to the post of District Food and Supplies Controller. From that of a Superintendent in the District Office, on the ground that he being a gazetted employee and in higher scale of pay as compared to respondent No. 3, should have been promoted to that post. It may be stated here that initially the petitioner had also raised come controversy with regard to their inter se seniority as Assistants in that Department, but at the time of hearing the learned counsel for the petitioner has given up that claim. So at the" moment what is required to be seen is ; who out of these two contesting Superintendents was entitled to promotion to the post of District Food and Supplies Controller. The case of the respondent authorities is that respondent No. 3, who was having a longer tenure of service as a Superintendent, was treated as senior to the petitioner and has thus been promoted to the post of District Food and Supplies Controller, a Class II post, in the light of sub-rule (3) of Rule 6 of the Punjab Food and Supplies (State Service Class II) Rules, 1968. This sub-rule reads :
"All appointments by promotion shall be made by selection on the basis of seniority-cum-merit and no person shall have any claim to any post in the service merely on the ground of " seniority.'

(2.)Shri Sehgal, learned Senior Advocate for the petitioner urges with some amount of vehemence in the light of clause (g) of sub-rule (1) of this very Rule, i.e., Rule 6 that the petitioner was entitled to be considered for the promotion in question as according to him this sub-clause makes it incumbent on the authority concerned to consider all the Superintendents working in the Department. This clause reads as follows:-
"In the case of District Food and Supplies Controller :

(i) by promotion of District Food and Supplies Officer, or Superintendent in the Department having an experience of working on any of the posts with a minimum period of two years."

(3.)Mr. Sehgal, however, concedes that there is no direct rule in Class III Rules governing the inter se seniority of Superintendents in the Head Office, vis-a-vis, the Superintendents in the Districts is contention is that the petitioner who was having better status, i.e., gazetted and was in a higher scale of pay, should have been treated as senior to respondent No. 3, though the latter had been appointed as Superintendent in the District Office much earlier to the appointment of the petitioner as Superintendent in the Head Office. It is difficult to accept this stand of Shri Sehgal in the absence of any statutory rule supporting him. By now it is well laid down that in the absence of a particular rule, governing a particular situation, as in the instant case, about the inter se seniority of the Superintendents in the Head Office vis-a-vis in the District Office, the competent authority could adopt any reasonable criteria which is not .unconscionable for determining their inter se seniority. In the light of this principle I see nothing wrong in the respondent authorities accepting the length of service of the two contestants as Superintendent as the criteria determining their inter se seniority. It has been stated in the affidavit of Shri Sudhir Mital, IAS, Deputy Secretary to Government that the inter se seniority of the two contestants was drawn up from amongst two separate seniority lists of the District Offices and Head Office and on the basis thereof respondent No. 3, who was having longer service as Superintendent, was considered senior to the petitioner. Sub-rule (3) of Rule 6 of Class II Rules, admittedly governs the promotion post. The appointing authority was well justified in selecting respondent No. 3, on the basis of seniority-cum-merit and promote him as District Food and Supplies Controller.