IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.14100 of 2006 Raj Ballabh Sinha, son of late Babu Kanhaiya Dayal Singh, resident of Village Gajraj Bigha, P.O. Machhaldiha, P.S. Nalanda, Dist. Nalanda. -------- Petitioner Versus 1. The State of Bihar through the Secretary, Department of Art, Culture and Youth Affairs, Govt. of Bihar, Patna. 2. The Director, Art Culture and Youth Affairs, Govt. of Bihar, Patna. 3. The Regional Deputy Director of Education, Magadh Division, Gaya. 4. The District Education Officer, Nawadah. -------- Respondents -------------- 3 20.12.2011 Heard learned counsel for the parties. The prayer of the petitioner in this writ application is for issuance of a direction to the respondents to make payment of monetary benefit, for difference of salary on account of time bound promotion with interest. Learned counsel for the petitioner would submit that the petitioner who had joined service on 17.12.1963 under the National Discipline Scheme Instruction of Government of India (NDSI) was subsequently shifted to the service of the State Government of Bihar where he had joined on 1.9.1973. It 2 has been submitted that the petitioner has got his first time bound promotion with effect from 1.4.1981 and second time bound promotion with effect from 17.12.1988 which was notified only on 21.3.2002 whereas the petitioner had retired from service on 31.12.1996 and, therefore, the Government was liable to not only pay arrears of salary under the both time bound promotions scheme but also interest on such amount of such arrears. In this regard, reliance was placed by him on an order of this Court in the case of Harendra Kishore Saran (CWJC No. 14170 of 2004). Counsel for the State, on the other hand, has submitted that the petitioner had earlier link with the Government of India service and as such, the fund for the same was to be reimbursed by the Government of India and the demand sent by the Government after notifying the promotion of the petitioner and others in the year 2002 had not made an effective response and the payment of the petitioner was only withheld on account of non-availability of fund. This Court, having noticed the aspect that the claim of the petitioner was admitted 3 and in fact there was no dispute of any nature whatsoever, had directed the counsel for the State to seek instruction as to within what period of time such payment could be made to the petitioner. Counsel for the State has produced the letter of the Principal Secretary of the Art, Culture and Youth Department date 19.12.2011, wherein, it has been stated that payment of arrears to ex-employees of NDSI have been disposed of by allocating fund to the concerned District Education Officer and the case of the petitioner was also being looked into. Having regard to the aforementioned admitted claim of the petitioner and the fact that the petitioner was an employee of the State of Bihar at the time of his retirement, whose time bound promotion was also notified by the Government of Bihar, the payment of such amount to the petitioner became entitled by way of arrears which ought to have been made without awaiting the release of fund by the Government of India. The petitioner had already retired from service in the year 1996 and was given such time bound promotion after his retirement and, therefore, he should not 4 have been made to wait for allocation of fund by the Government of India. Be that as it may, since now the fund have been allocated, this Court would direct the Principal Secretary of Art, Culture and youth Department to ensure that the arrears payable to the petitioner on account of his both time bound promotions must be paid to him within one month of the date of receipt of the copy of the order. This Court, however, would not grant any payment of interest on the aforementioned amount for two reasons. Firstly the payment of interest can only be made if there is a statutory provision. There is no provision for payment of interest on arrears of salary unlike in the case of payment of gratuity or pension. This Court will also not allow payment of interest to the petitioner because it is not an individual case of the petitioner, which got delayed in the process of notifying time bound promotion. The order contained in Annexure-1 would go to show that as many as 73 persons who had either retired or continuing in service were made entitled for grant of such time bound promotion by 5 computing the period of service of the Government of India. Such policy decision relating to a large number of absorbed employees definitely require a conscious application of mind and could not have been decided in a huff only in the case of the petitioner. That being so, this Court, keeping in view the reasons and object mentioned in the order of the petitioner on 21.3.2002, would not allow payment of interest as prayed for. The reliance placed by the learned counsel for the petitioner on the order of Harendra Kishor Saran is also wholly misplaced. In the case of Harendra Kishor Saran (supra), there was no direction for payment of interest on the arrears of salary and that was the case where the petitioner’s retirement benefit was withheld and when that was sought to be enhanced in this Court it had allowed payment of interest at the rate of 5% per annum. That being so, this application, so far claim of payment of interest is concerned, must be and is hereby rejected. With the aforementioned observations 6 and direction, this application is disposed of. Rsh (Mihir Kumar Jha, J.)