- (1.) HEARD Sri Shailesh, learned counsel for the petitioner and Sri Anoop Kumar Mehta, learned counsel for the respondents.
(2.) THE petitioner in this writ application has prayed for issuance of a direction upon the respondent B.C.C.L. to correct the entry in respect of the date of birth of her husband, who was an employee under the respondent B.C.C.L., and upon making such correction, to direct the respondents to pay compensation to her for the pecuniary loss caused to her family on account of the forcible premature retirement of her husband. The facts of the petitioner's case in brief are as follows : - The petitioner's husband Late Brahmdeo Ravidas was inducted in the employment of the respondent B.C.C.L. as a Trip Munshi on 24.12.1973. At the time of his appointment, his date of birth was recorded in the statutory Form -B Register of his service records as 30 years on 24.12.1973. The Form -B Register contains the L.T.I. of the deceased husband of the petitioner. However, in the statutory Form -A Register maintained under the C.M.P.F. Scheme, the petitioner's husband had declared his date of birth as 04.07.1944. The concerned authorities of the respondents accepted the employee's self -declared date of birth 04.07.1944 to be correct and accordingly, the employee was to superannuate on the last day of July, 2004 on attaining the age of 60 years. Though no controversy was raised by the employee in respect of the entry concerning his date of birth in the service records, a Medical Board was constituted in the year 1989 and the petitioner's husband was directed to appear before the Medical Board on 10.04.1989. The Medical Board, after examining him, had assessed his age on 10.04.1989 as 40 years. The result of the examination of the employee conducted by the Medical Board was published on 01.06.1989 in which the name of the petitioner's husband had appeared at Sl. No. 18. The petitioner claims that on the basis of the age assessment made by the Medical Board, necessary corrections were carried out in the service records of the petitioner's husband including the Form -B Register. The petitioner's contention is that such corrections were permissible and were made by way of Implementation Instruction No. 76 of N.C.W.A. -3 of the respondent company. Yet, despite such corrections being made in the Form -B Register, the respondent authorities by serving a notice dated 01.04.2004, informed that the petitioner's husband would retire on 31.07.2004, treating his date of birth as
(3.) 07.1944, as recorded in the E.D.P. records. Upon receipt of the notice, the petitioner's husband submitted his letter of protest praying for making necessary corrections in the E.D.P. records in accordance with the corrected entry made in the Form -B Register and not to force him to retire on 31.07.2004. The case of the petitioner's husband was thereafter forwarded by the Personnel Manager of the respondent company on 06.05.2004 to the "Age Determination Committee" for correction of his date of birth. Inspite of all these efforts seeking correction of the entry of the date of birth, the petitioner's husband was made to retire from service on 31.07.2004. Even after retirement, he pursued his claim by filing his representations before the concerned authorities of the respondents. The Deputy Chief Personnel Manager Area -IX and the General Manager Area -IX, being convinced of the genuineness of the claim of the employee, had recommended the employee's case for the necessary correction in the entry concerning his date of birth on 17.01.2005 to the higher authorities. The petitioner's husband also moved the Mazdoor Union and the Union also took up his case for redressal of his grievance before the concerned authorities of the respondents. While the matter was pending at the level of the labour union, the petitioner's husband died on 29.10.2005. After the death of her husband, the petitioner's son submitted an application before the respondents seeking his compassionate appointment and when his prayer was not considered by the respondents, he filed a writ application before this Court on 30.11.2006 vide W.P. (S) No. 7123 of 2006. The writ application was disposed of on 11.12.2006 with a direction to the concerned authorities of the respondents to consider the petitioner's claim for compassionate appointment and to pass appropriate orders in accordance with law. Pursuant to the order, the petitioner's son filed a representation before the Respondent No. 2 on 23.01.2007 for compassionate appointment but his claim was dismissed by the respondents by order dated 17.03.2007. Being aggrieved by the order, the petitioner's son again moved this Court by filing a writ application vide W.P.(S) No. 2668 of 2007 on 04.05.2007. However, the writ petition was dismissed by a Bench of this Court on 18.12.2007. The appeal against the order of the Single Judge, preferred by the petitioner's son, vide L.P.A. No. 24 of 2008 was dismissed by the Division Bench vide order dated 06.02.2008. 4 Learned counsel for the petitioner would explain that though in the earlier writ applications, the prayer made by the petitioner's son was in respect of his grievance for not granting him compassionate appointment and also his grievance against the non -correction of the date of birth of his father, but no decision on the issue relating to claim for correction of the entry relating to date of birth was passed by this Court. The second writ application was considered only on the issue of the writ petitioner's claim for compassionate appointment and the same was dismissed on the ground that such claim was made after about ten months of the retirement of the employee. It is further explained that though the appeal against the Single Bench judgement of this Court was dismissed, but with an observation that the writ petitioner, if aggrieved over the date of retirement of his father, may seek his remedy elsewhere. Learned counsel explains that the petitioner's claim for seeking the relief for correction in the entries in respect of the date of birth of her deceased husband in the service records, has therefore not been foreclosed by any of the orders passed by this Court in the aforementioned writ applications and in the present writ application the petitioner's prayer essentially is for payment of compensation for the loss and detriment suffered by the family of the deceased employee on account of his premature retirement.;