RANJIT SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner's wife died in harness. After the death of his wife, the petitioner was granted family pension. Besides granting family pension to the petitioner, his daughter was granted employment on compassionate grounds. Despite the fact, that the petitioner's daughter was accommodated in government employment, the petitioner continued to draw family pension alongwith dearness allowance. The authorities, on realising, that the petitioner could not have been paid dearness allowance in addition to the family pension after his daughter had been given employment on compassionate grounds, have sought to recover the same.

(2.) Learned counsel for the petitioner does not challenge the action of the authorities in arriving at the conclusion that the petitioner was not entitled to dearness allowance on family pension after the employment of his daughter on compassionate grounds. The petitioner, however, wishes to limit his claim so as to challenge the recovery of dearness allowance wrongfully paid to him. The limited relief sought by the petitioner in this case is based on the determination rendered by a Division Bench of this Court in Mukhtiar Singh and others V. State of Punjab and others (CWP No.891 of 2003 decided on 20.1.2004). The decision rendered by this Court in Mukhtiar Singh's case (supra) was based on the decision of the Supreme Court in Sahib Ram V. State of Haryana and others, 1995(1) Services Cases Today 668.

(3.) Learned counsel for the respondents, in order to controvert the claim of the petitioner so as to assert, that recovery should be made from the petitioner, placed reliance on a decision rendered by the Apex Court in Union of India and others Vs. Smt. Sujatha Vedachalam and another, 2000 (3) Recent Services Judgments, 47, wherein, the Apex Court had allegedly arrived at the conclusion, that recovery could be made from an employee whose pay had been wrongly refixed.