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Judgment
Basant Balaji, J
The writ petitioner is the Kerala State Cashew Development Corporation represented by its Managing Director. Through this writ petition Ext.P1 order of the 1st respondent, dismissing the appeal on the ground of a delay of 373 days in filing the appeal is challenged. The workers of the factory approached the Deputy Labour Commissioner by filing G.C. No.20/2012 - 56/2012, claiming the gratuity amount due to the workers. As per Ext.P2 order, the Deputy Labour Commissioner allowed the petitions. Aggrieved by Ext.P2, the writ petitioner filed a Gratuity Appeal as Ext.P3, and filed a petition as Ext.P4 for condoning the delay of 310 days in filing the appeal. The appellate authority/1st respondent dismissed the delay condonation application through Ext.P1.
The main contention raised by the counsel for the petitioner is that in Ext.P4, it is specifically averred that though the original order of the controlling authority dated 30.09.2019 was received on 03.10.2019 in the office and the appeal ought to have been filed on or before 02.12.2019, the appeal could not be filed since it was misplaced from the office and the concerned officer was transferred to another section. Another averment is that from April 2020 onwards there was no proper functioning of the office due to COVID-19 pandemic and it started functioning only on 01.10.2020 onwards. Therefore, the appeal could only be filed after 01.10.2020, thus the delay of 310 days occurred in filing the appeal.
Section 7 of the Payment of Gratuity Act deals Determination of the amount of gratuity and Sub Section 7 deals with appeal, and it states as follows:
(7) Any person aggrieved by an order under sub-section (4) may, within sixty days from the date of receipt of the order, prefer an appeal to the appropriate Government or such other authority as may be specified by the appropriate Government in this behalf:
Provided that the appropriate Government or the appellate authority, as the case may be, may, if it is satisfied that the appellant was prevented by sufficient cause from preferring the appeal within the said period of sixty days, extend the said period by a further period of sixty days.
[Provided further that no appeal by an employer shall be admitted unless at the time of preferring the appeal, the appellant either produces a certificate of the controlling authority to the effect that the appellant has deposited with him an amount equal to the amount of gratuity required to be deposited under sub-section (4), or deposits with the appellate authority such amount.]
The COVID-19 pandemic attacked the country at the end of March 2020, and the Apex Court has taken suo motu Civil No.3 of 2020, taken note of the said fact, and has directed that in computing the period of limitation for any suit, appeal, application or proceeding from the period from 15.03.2020 till 28.02.2022 shall stand excluded. The original order was passed on 30.09.2019 and the period of limitation for filing the appeal is sixty days. However, another sixty days can be condoned by the authority on sufficient cause. The said 120 days had expired by the end of February 2020. Since the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972 does not give the power to condone the delay of more than sixty days, Ext.P1 order passed by the 1st appellate authority is legally in order. Therefore, the challenge to Ext.P1 will not be sustained.
The writ petition stands dismissed.