IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.19899 of 2009 Date of Decision : February 24, 2011. Gurcharan Singh Bath and another .....Petitioners versus State of Punjab and others .....Respondents CORAM : HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE SURYA KANT. Present : None for the petitioners. Ms.Monica Chhibbar Sharma, DAG, Punjab. -.- 1. Whether Reporters of Local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2. To be referred to the Reporters or not? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? --- Surya Kant, J. (Oral) The petitioners are the father and son, respectively. Their grievance is against the impugned letters dated 21.10.2009, 27.10.2009 and 4.11.2009 (Annexures P-6, P-7 & P-9) whereby the certificate that petitioner No.2 is Lineal Descendent of petitioner No.1 has been declined. The first petitioner is an Ex-serviceman who applied for issuance of the Lineal Descendent Certificate for his son, namely, petitioner No.2 but the Directorate of Sainik Welfare, Punjab, has declined the same on the plea that the 'second child' of petitioner No.1 is not entitled to such a certificate. It may be mentioned here that the petitioner has already got issued a Lineal Descendent certificate in favour of his daughter who has been appointed as a Teacher against the post reserved for the wards of Ex- C.W.P.No .19899 of 2009 2 servicemen. The respondents have in support of the impugned decision, placed on record a set of the Punjab Recruitment of Ex-serviceman Rules, 1982 (hereinafter referred to as `the Rules') framed under the proviso to Article 309 of the Constitution. The expression “Lineal Descendent” is defined in Clause 2 (aa) of these Rules and reads as follows:- “.....(aa) “Lineal descendent” means sons/daughters (married/unmarried/widowed/legally divorced) of the re-employed/ unemployed Ex-Serviceman.” Rule-4 of these Rules provides reservation of vacancies in favour of the Ex-servicemen, but in the event of their non-availability, the rule enables to fill up the same by appointing the wife or “one dependent child of an Ex-serviceman” who has never been recruited against the reserved vacancy under these Rules. The proviso to Rule 4 further provides that a 'wife' or 'dependent child' of the Ex-serviceman shall be “eligible to avail the benefit only once in life”. Rule 4 reads as follows:- “4. Reservation of vacancies (1) Subject to the provisions of Rule 3, 13% of vacancies to be filled in by direct appointment in all the State Civil Services and posts connected with the affairs of the State of Punjab shall be reserved for being filled in by recruitment of Ex- servicemen; (Note: As per Punjab Government letter No.15/25/2001-4DW/1591 dated 21.5.2002, an Ex- serviceman is allowed the benefit of reservation for the second time and even thereafter in subsequent C.W.P.No .19899 of 2009 3 recruitments in accordance with the provisions of these Rules). # Provided that where an Ex-serviceman is not available for recruitment against a reserved vacancy, such a vacancy shall be reserved to be filled in any recruitment of the wife or one dependent child of an ex- serviceman, who has neither been recruited against a reserved vacancy under these rules; # Provided further that the wife or the dependent child of the ex-serviceman shall be recruited against the reserved vacancy subject to the conditions that:- i) he or she possesses the prescribed qualifications and is within the prescribed age limits; ii) he or she is not already in service; iii) he or she will be eligible to avail the benefit only once in life......” There is no challenge to the vires of the above re-produced rule which is statutory in character. The respondents are, thus, fully justified to refuse the 'Lineal Descendent Certificate' to the second child of petitioner No.1 in the light of the embargo created by the aforesaid rule for the reason that the same benefit has already been availed by petitioner No.1 for one of his child, namely, his daughter. Dismissed. February 24, 2011 (SURYA KANT) Mohinder JUDGE