- (1.) The petitioner is an employee of the Eastern Coal Fields Limited, i.e., the respondent no. 2. He was appointed in the year 1980. According to the petitioner he appeared in the School Final examination in the year 1975 and in the Admit Card that was issued by the concerned Board his date of birth appears as October 3, 1957. The school where he studied also issued a certificate to that effect. At the time of entry into his service the petitioner disclosed his date of birth as that and he submitted the proof of his educational documents. According to him the respondents authorities did not correct the date of birth as October 3, 1957. They adopted a policy to prove the uniformity of the service record of all employees and in the year 1987 a service excerpts form had been supplied to all the employees including the petitioner for any objection so that it could be rectified. There the petitioner had noticed that the date of birth was wrongly recorded and in the columns specified therefor he raised his objection that his date of birth should be corrected.
(2.) The petitioner has claimed that in the year 2011 he came to learn that the date of birth had not been properly mentioned in his service record and he raised a dispute by several representations. The grievance of the petitioner is that he was asked to appear before the Age Dispute Committee and according to the implementation of Instruction No. 76 the respondents authorities are under an obligation to correct the date of birth as October 3, 1957.
(3.) By the present writ petition the petitioner has inter alia prayed for a writ in the nature of Mandamus commanding the respondents to correct the date of birth of the petitioner as October 3, 1957 and for other reliefs. This writ petition has been contested by the respondents by filing an affidavit-in-opposition wherein the material allegations of the writ petition have been denied. The respondents' case inter aila is this that while accepting the employment the petitioner had returned one copy of the letter of appointment. At the time of joining the service he did not submit any documentary evidence in support of the date of birth. Therefore, the relevant column in the letter of appointment relating to the age was kept blank. He was issued a Photo Identity Card on which he had put his signature in token of his acceptance and knowledge about the recorded date of birth and age in the company's record as assessed by the Medical Officer of the colliery. The assessed age as on June 30, 1986 was 34 years. The petitioner was obliged to sign the statutory Form B under the relevant provisions of the Mine Rules where he had declared his age as 34 years as on June 30, 1986 and as per the stipulation under column 16 the petitioner had put his signature in clear handwriting and in the service excerpts he had recorded his observation to the effect that his date of birth was October 31, 1957.;