GANESH BAHADUR Vs. UNION OF INDIA AND ANOTHER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Ganesh Bahadur was recruited as a Driver in the Indian Army on March 14, 1963 and retired in November 1978, whereafter he was granted military pension. The petitioner was thereafter appointed as a Driver by the Punjab National Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited, Naya Nangal (hereinafter referred to as PNFC) on June 20, 1983 and worked with the said Company till September 1997. According to the petitioner the Company had started incurring losses and decided not to grant dearness relief. However, when the respondents herein, without issuing any show-cause notice or providing the petitioner with an opportunity of being heard, decided to recover the payment of dearness relief granted to the petitioner along with the military pension for the period July 1983 to September 2001 on the ground of over payment of dearness relief, the petitioner filed a representation against this action of the respondents but without considering the facts and the representation of the petitioner, the impugned orders of recovery dated January 23, 2003 and February 18, 2003, Annexures P-6 and P-7, respectively were passed for recovery of Rs. 19,572/- consisting of the over payment of the dearness relief to him. The recovery was to be effected from the pension of the petitioner. The petitioner has filed this petition for quashing the impugned orders Annexures P-6 and P-7 which were passed without affording him an opportunity of hearing and were violative of principles of natural justice. Reliance was placed on Sahib Ram v. State of Haryana, 1995 1 SCT 668.

(2.) In the written statement filed by the respondents it was pleaded that the competent authority had rightly deducted the amount of dearness allowance from the pension because the petitioner had been re-employed with PNFC with effect from May 18, 1983. It was submitted by the respondents that since the petitioner got re-employment, he became disentitled for dearness allowance on pension and this issue had already been decided by the Supreme Court in Union of India and others v. Vasudevan Pillay and others etc., 1995 2 SLR 21. Therefore, the impugned orders had been justifiably passed and the petitioner was not entitled to dearness allowance on his pension which was required to be recovered from him.

(3.) Sahib Ram's case did not deal with Dearness allowance on pension being received by a pensioner after his re-employment but it was a case of release of pay scale on misinterpretation of a relaxation clause where the upgraded pay had been released to the petitioner by mistake. There had been no misrepresentation or fraud by the petitioner. Therefore, the court had held that he amount may not be recovered from the employee but he would not be entitled to draw the upgraded scale any further.