S.S. Sandhawalia, C.J. - (1.) The background against which this application for review of our judgment dated May 9, 1983, has come up deserves recapitulation. The facts appear in the main judgment and it is unnecessary to repeat them. Suffice it to mention that the admission of this petition was limited by the Motion Bench expressly to the twin grounds of seniority and salary for the period of suspension of the petitioner. The reference to the Division Bench was primarily for the determination of the significant question whether the writ Court was empowered to limit the scope of the lie in a writ petition to one or more specific grounds at the stage of admission. It was on this question that the primary attention was focused when the matter originally came up for hearing before the Division Bench. It would appear that the learned counsel for the petitioner confined his arguments on the aforesaid issue while keeping his powder dry for urging the merits of the grounds which may become available to him in accordance with the answer to the preliminary issue. On the said point, we held against the petitioner to the effect that the Motion Bench was empowered to limit the admission of the writ petition to one or more specific grounds only. Since no arguments on merits were advanced, the writ petition was ordered to be dismissed.
(2.) Thereafter the present application for review has been moved primarily on the ground that the counsel for the petitioner (and indeed the counsel for both the parties) was under the impression that the Division Bench was considering only the preliminary question and the matter of merits would be later relegated to a Single Bench for decision. It is the stand that for this reason, arguments on merits were never advanced, therefore, the writ petition had been inadvertently dismissed on the assumption that the counsel had nothing further to urge. Notice of this application was given to the learned counsel for the respondents, Mr. A. S. Nehra. It must redound to his credit that eschewing any petty advantage he forthrightly took the fair stand that he also had been equally under the impression that the merits of the case were not to be agitated before the Division Bench. Because of these peculiar circumstances and the reasons appearing above we review our earlier judgment of May 9, 1983, and recall the observations made in paragraph 14 thereof with regard to the merits of the case on which no argument admittedly was addressed by the learned counsel for the parties. We grant leave to the parties to address us afresh thereon. However, as a matter of abundant caution it is reiterated that the rest of the judgment remains wholly intact and is in no way affected by this limited review.
(3.) At the very threshold, it may be noticed that the matter has inevitably now to be confined to the twin questions pertaining to the seniority of the writ petitioner and the question of his entitlement to salary for the period of suspension. Learned counsel for the petitioner very categorically stated that so far as the second question of salary for the period of suspension is concerned, he has already been granted the relief by the respondent-State and this issue no longer survives.;