KAULI DEVI Vs. STATE OF H.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) BOTH these petitions are being disposed of by a common order as both these petitions pertain to common subject matter.

(2.) THE petitioner(s) herein are aggrieved by the orders of 30.11.2013, which are compilation by the respondents of the marks obtained by the aspirants to the post of Anganwari Workers. They, in their respective writ petitions, pray that the orders of 30.11.2013 be quashed and set -aside whereby respondents No. 6 in each petition were appointed as an Anganwari worker. Before proceeding to test the tenacity of the submission addressed by the learned counsel for the petitioner(s) herein against the selection and appointment of respondents No. 6 in both writ petitions as Anganwari Workers by the respondents it is apt to refer to the fact that petitioners herein had challenged before the appellate authority the selection and appointment of respondents No. 6 in each petition as Anganwari workers. The appeals were time barred hence came to be dismissed. The reasoning as adopted by the learned Additional District Magistrate, Mandi, District Mandi, while holding that the appeals preferred against the selection and appointment of respondents No. 6 as Anganwari Workers are not maintainable, being time barred, is tenable in view of the fact that when admittedly, the appeals were time barred and with no empowerment having been bestowed by the apt guidelines upon the Additional District Magistrate, Mandi to condone the delay or enlarge time, as such, when the provisions of Section 5 of the Limitation Act, vesting jurisdiction or legal competence only upon courts of law and not upon the authority who rendered the impugned annexures, to condone delay. Consequently, the appeals being time barred were not maintainable, as such, they came to be tenably dismissed by the appellate authority. Therefore, when the appeals preferred by the appellants before the appellate authority were time barred and no statutory power vesting in the appellate authority to condone delay or enlarge the time prescribed in the apt guidelines, as such, when hence the appellate authority did incisively discern the available material on record to gauge the tenacity of the submissions of the counsel for the appellants before him qua the factum of the appeals being not time barred and on appraisal thereof concluded that the appeals are barred by time and with no provisions existing in the apt guidelines to condone delay or enlarge the period prescribed for the filing of appeals that hence the appeals are not maintainable. Consequently, the appreciation of material existing before the appellate authority does not warrant any interference as it does not suffer from any perversity or absurdity constituted or arising from mis -appreciation and non appreciation of material on record.

(3.) THE learned counsel for the petitioner canvases that Annexure R -1 clarifies that the period of 15 days for the preferment of an appeal before the appellate authority against the selection/appointment of the Anganwari worker of the authority concerned is reckonable from the date of appointment of the selected candidate. While testing the legality of the said submission it is imperative to advert to annexures P -1 and annexure P -2. However, annexure P -1 unravels the fact that respondent No. 6 was issued appointment letter on 13.3.2013. Nonetheless, the appeals assailing their appointments were preferred on 12.4.2013 and 11.4.2013, respectively, hence, beyond the period prescribed in the apt guidelines for the preferment of an appeal against the selection and appointment of a person as an Anganwari worker. Though there is a specific averment in paragraph 7 of the grounds of appeal comprised in Annexure P -4 of the petitioner herein having applied for a copy of the appointment letter, however the date on which the petitioner Jamna Devi applied for the same has not been mentioned therein nor any material has been placed on record either before the appellate authority or before this court portraying that as a matter of fact the petitioner had applied for a copy of the appointment letter of respondent No. 6 within the period prescribed for filing of appeal and that it was supplied subsequently, so as to then render the delay, if any, to be while being well explained, being condonable as also then constituting the appeal to be maintainable. In the absence thereof, the averment comprised in paragraph 7 of annexure P -4 is to be construed to be wholly incredible. Obviously then it has to be held that the copy of the appointment letter of respondents No. 6 was obtained beyond the period prescribed in the apt guidelines. Besides, even when in Annexure P -3 there is a disclosure in paragraph (ii) of the petitioner, Kauli Devi, having applied for a copy of the appointment letter of the selected candidate on 12.3.2013 and it came to be supplied to her on 1.4.2013, as such, while deducting the period spent for obtaining copy of the appointment letter, the appeal was maintainable, nonetheless in the absence of material on record, divulging the fact that the respective petitioners applied for a copy of appointment letter issued by the respondents in favour of the selected candidates within limitation, it has to be concluded that the copy came to be applied for and supplied beyond the period of limitation, as such, the decision rendered by the appellate authority construing that the appeals are barred by limitation does not suffer from any perversity or absurdity constituted or arising from mis -appreciation and non appreciation of material on record.