State of H.P. and Another vs Udham Singh

Deepak Gupta, J.—This review petition is totally misconceived. The erstwhile H.P. State Administrative Tribunal vide its order dated 27.6.2001 allowed the application filed by Respondent Udham Singh and directed that half of the service rendered by him on daily wage basis as daily rated worker and full service as regularized worker, be taken into consideration for calculating his pensionary benefits etc.

Aggrieved by the said order of the learned Tribunal, the State filed CWP No. 388 of 2002 in this Court. This Court in State of H.P. and Ors. v. Sarab Dayal, being CWP No. 180 of 2001, decided on 19.7.2007, held that 50% of service rendered on daily wage basis should be counted for the purpose of calculating qualifying service for grant of pensionary benefits. Following the law laid down in Sarab Dayal''s case, the writ petition filed by the State was dismissed and a specific direction was issued that total service of 13 years and 2 months of the Respondent shall be treated as qualifying service and the State was directed to pay the retiral benefits accordingly.

The State of H.P. not satisfied by the said judgment of this Court, filed a SLP before the Apex Court, which was dismissed on the ground that it was highly delayed. The relevant portion of the order passed by the Apex Court reads as follows:

There is a delay of more then 500 days in refilling the Special Leave Petitions for which no proper explanation has been given. The Special Leave Petitions are, therefore, dismissed on the ground of delay. However, the question of law is left open.

Thereafter, the State filed a review petition, which was dismissed on both grounds of delay as well as on merit. The order of the Apex Court reads as follows:

These review petitions have been filed seeking review of our order dated 13th August, 2009, whereby the special leave petitions filed by the Petitioners were dismissed.

Although there is a delay of 152 days, even otherwise having gone through the review petitions and the connected papers, we do not find any ground to review the aforementioned order. The review petitions are accordingly dismissed on the ground of delay as also on merit.

It is however pertinent to mention that the State of H.P. had challenged the judgment passed by this Court in Sarab Dayal''s case and other connected cases. These petitions were disposed of by the Apex Court on 5.5.2011. The Apex Court held that the State of H.P. had set up an entirely new case before the Apex Court without any pleadings with regard to the new case set up. Thereafter, the Apex 3 Court set aside the judgment of this Court in Sarab Dayal''s case and remitted the matter to this Court for fresh adjudication. Relevant portion of the judgment of the Apex Court reads as follows:

We have perused the records and heard the Learned Counsel for the parties. We are of the considered view that an entirely new case has been weaved out before this Court. There are no pleadings to that effect. In this view of the matter, we are constrained to set aside the impugned judgment of the High Court and remit the matters to the High Court for fresh adjudication. To avoid any confusion, we direct the State to file a comprehensive amended writ petition in the High Court within eight weeks and reply of the same be filed within eight weeks thereafter and rejoinder, if any, within four weeks thereafter.

Now the present review petition has been filed in this Court. We fail to understand how such a review petition is maintainable before this Court after the Apex Court in the SLP arising out of these proceedings has already dismissed the SLP and also the review petition both on the grounds of delay and on merit.

The State has taken a totally untenable stand that because the Supreme Court has set aside the judgment of this Court in Sarab Dayal''s case and remanded the matter to this Court and has also directed the State to file a comprehensive amended writ petition, it can ask for review of judgment in this case also. The State wants this Court to reopen the matter which already stands finalized by the Apex Court. Once the petitions filed by the State were dismissed by the Apex Court the order of this Court attained finality. This order cannot be recalled only on the ground that the judgment in Sarab Dayal''s case has been set aside by the Apex Court. This Court cannot sit in appeal over the judgment of the Apex Court.

The review petition is barred by 3 years 10 months and 27 days. The State agitated the matter before the Apex Court, which dismissed the petitions. There is no ground to condone the inordinate delay.

We are shocked at the way in which the State has behaved in this matter. The employee was not paid his dues for almost 4 years. He filed Contempt Petition No. 94 of 2011, in which notice was issued to the contemnors and on 31.5.2011 all the contemnors were present in person and had assured this Court that by the next date, the orders of the Court would be complied with. Instead of complying with orders and the assurance held out to this Court they filed the review petition. This action is highly reprehensible. The review is therefore dismissed with costs assessed at Rs. 10,000/-.