IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA, CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.14567 of 2007 Date of Decision: March 09, 2009 Surinder Singh .....PETITIONER(S) VERSUS Raksha Suraksha Corps Kendra & Another .....RESPONDENT(S) . . . CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE AJAI LAMBA PRESENT: - Mr. Sudhir Mittal, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Mohit Garg, Advocate, for the respondents. . . . AJAI LAMBA, J (Oral) This civil writ petition filed under Article 226/227 of the Constitution of India prays for issuance of a writ for quashing Order dated 30.7.2007 (Annexure P-4) whereby the petitioner has been discharged from service. Learned counsel for the petitioner has pleaded that the petitioner was discharged from regular Army on 31.12.2002. The particulars of the petitioner were maintained in the list of persons who were desirous of re-enrolment in Defence Security Coprs. Learned counsel has drawn the CWP No.14567 of 2007 [2] attention of the Court towards Annexure P-1 which details the service particulars furnished and duly signed by the Record Officer. Column No.12 of Annexure P-1 indicates that the petitioner had two red ink entries during the last 5 years of service immediately preceding the date of discharge from service. Be that as it may, the petitioner was informed vide Annexure P-2 that there were vacancies available for Ex-Servicemen for enrolment into Defence Security Corps (for short, `DSC’). On the request of the petitioner, and seniority list maintained in the Office, the name of the petitioner had come up for enrolment. Accordingly, the petitioner was advised to report to the Centre by 8.1.2007 alongwith service documents. The petitioner was re-enrolled in DSC on 20.1.2007. The petitioner received a show cause notice, appended with the petition as Annexure P-3, wherein a reference has been made to a Ministry of Defence Letter dated 2.11.2005 which stipulates that Ex-Servicemen who had incurred more than one red ink entry during the last five years of former service were not eligible for re-enrolment in DSC. The detail of red ink entries has been given out in the show cause notice. The petitioner accordingly was informed that re-enrolment was irregular and therefore, it was proposed that the petitioner be discharged. The petitioner could respond to the show CWP No.14567 of 2007 [3] cause notice within seven days of receipt of the notice. Although reply to the notice has not been placed on record, it however transpires that vide Annexure P-4 i.e. impugned order, the petitioner was discharged from service w.e.f. 31.7.2007. Contention of learned counsel for the petitioner is two fold. Learned counsel states that the case of the petitioner would be covered under Section 15 of the Army Act, 1950 (for short, `the Act’) as reproduced in Para 8 of the petition. The other contention is that Letter dated 2.11.2005 was in existence at the point in time when the petitioner was re-enrolled. In such circumstances, it has to be legally accepted that the irregularity in re-enrolment of the petitioner had been waived. Learned counsel for the respondents has opposed the prayer of the petitioner and has referred to Letter dated 2.11.2005 placed on record as Annexure R-1. I have heard the learned counsel and have gone through the documents referred by the learned counsel. Section 15 of the Act provides as follows:- “15. Validity of enrolment.- Every person who has for the space of three months been in receipt of pay as a person enrolled under this Act and been borne on the rolls of any corps or department shall be deemed to have been duly enrolled, and shall not be entitled to claim his discharge on CWP No.14567 of 2007 [4] the ground of any irregularity or illegality in his enrolment or on any other ground whatsoever ; and if any person, in receipt of such pay and borne on the rolls as aforesaid, claims his discharge before the expiry of three months from his enrolment, no such irregularity or illegality or other ground shall, until he is discharged in pursuance of his claim, affect his position as an enrolled person under this Act or invalidate any proceeding, act or thing taken or done prior to his discharge.” Perusal of provisions of Section 15 indicates that the rights of a person, enrolled or re-enrolled in Army have been given out. The provision does not refer to the rights of the Army Authorities to discharge a person in case he had been irregularly re-enrolled. In this view of the matter, the petitioner cannot take any benefit of the provisions of Section 15 of the Act. So far as waiver is concerned, no doubt that Annexure P-1 made it evident that the respondent authorities were informed that there were two red ink entries during the last five years of service immediately preceding the date of discharge of the petitioner from the regular Army, however, Letter, Annexure R-1 is very clear in its contents. Relevant portion of Annexure R-1 reads as under:- “2. A study has been carried out on revision of the existing terms and conditions for re-enrolment of person into DSC. It has been decided that henceforth all Rig Agencies will follow the following major changes while carrying out the re-enrolment of Ex-servicemen into DSC. xx xx xx xx xx xx xx b) Discipline OR: Only those personnel who have not more than 1 red ink entry during last 5 years of former service and not more than 3 red ink entries during their entire former service are eligible for re-enrolment into DSC. Please amend Para 2(a) and (b) of this HQ letter to 62502 /Rtg 5 (OR) (A) dt 21 Nov 2002 accordingly.” Annexure R-1 clearly indicates that so CWP No.14567 of 2007 [5] as to maintain discipline, only those personnel who have not more than one red ink entry during the last five years of former service would be eligible for re-enrolment. It is the admitted case of the petitioner that the petitioner could not have been re-enrolled as he had two red ink entries in the preceding five years before his discharge. It stands established that the petitioner had been re-enrolled in the Army even though instructions were clear that he could not have been re-enrolled. I have also taken note of the fact that before passing any order which would adversely effect rights of the petitioner, a show cause notice was issued. All the grounds taken in this petition were available to him. Response to the show cause notice has not been placed on record for consideration of this Court. Be that as it may, it being the admitted position that the petitioner was re-enrolled even though there were infirmities in his case and he could not have been enrolled, no ground for interference in writ jurisdiction is made out. The petition is dismissed. (AJAI LAMBA) March 09, 2009 JUDGE avin