IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA CWJC No.10505 of 2009 RAJENDRA MISHRA, son of Late-Surya Pal Mishra, resident of village- Akbarpur, Police Station-Naubatpur, District-Patna. ……Petitioner Versus 1. Bihar State Electricity Board through its Secretary, Vidhut Bhawan, Baily Road, Patna. 2. The General Manager, Central Area, B.S.E.B., Serpentine Road(New Daroga Rai Path), Patna-800001. 3. The Superintending Electrical Engineer, B.S.E.B., Patna Circle, ‘R’ Block, Road No. 1, Patna-800001. ……...Respondents. ----------- 02. 24.08.2009 The petitioner when he joined the service of the Bihar State Electricity Board has declared his date of birth as 13.05.1948. Much later controversy arose as to the declaration of the age and the Electricity Board constituted a Medical Board for determining the age of the petitioner. The Medical Board submitted its report assessing the age of petitioner between 56 to 58 years as on 21.11.1998. The Board took the average of the two extreme years and treated petitioner to be 57 years of age as on 21.11.1998. Petitioner filed writ petition. The said writ petition was disposed of giving benefit to the petitioner of the lower age in the range given by the Medical Board. Effectively the finding of the High Court was that the age of the petitioner would be treated as 56 years as on 21.11.1998. Against the said judgment, Board preferred Letters patent Appeal. In the Letters Patent Appeal, it was pointed - 2 - out that a similar issue involving the Board was pending before the Apex Court and as such Letters Patent Appeal was adjourned pending decision of the Supreme Court. The order of the single Judge was stayed. The matter before the Apex Court was then taken up and the Apex Court decided substantially in favour of the writ petitioner. That decision was rendered in the year 2002 itself by the Apex Court where Board’s appeal was dismissed. Now the Board’s LPA against the writ order in case of petitioner was taken up and in 2008 the Letters Patent Appeal of the Board was dismissed. Thus affirming the order of the Single Judge passed in favour of the petitioner. Petitioner, in the meantime, had been retired prematurely on basis of age as assessed at 57 years by the Electricity Board. Petitioner has filed this writ petition for payment of arrears of salary for one year as the consequence of the order which was in favour of the petitioner not being interfered with. In view of the facts aforesaid, learned counsel for the Electricity very fairly states that in view of the sequence of events as noted above, the Board normally could not deny the salary to the petitioner but as the petitioner had not worked for the period for the last one year, no payment can be made to him on basis of principle of no work no payment. In my view, the said argument has been noted - 3 - only to be rejected. Here petitioner had done all he could to seek continuation of his employment. The Board on its own finding stopped the petitioner. The petitioner being ready and willing to work and not doing anything of his own which unable Board not to take work from him, Board can not now turn around and say that I ought to have permitted you to work but having not permitted you to work which having been found wrong by the Court, still will not give you right to receive payment. In my view, that is not permissible. It must not be forgotten that Board is a creature of statute and State within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution, it must in all its affairs conduct itself in conformity with Article 14 of the Constitution. Its action must be judged fair and equitable. Here the action is neither just nor fair not equitable. Petitioner can not be deprived of his legitimate dues. Let the writ of mandamus be issued accordingly. The writ application is allowed. Shageer (Navaniti Prasad Singh, J)