IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB & HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.7329 of 1994 Date of Decision : January 13, 2011. Bhalinder Singh and others .....Petitioners versus The Punjab State Electricity Board and another .....Respondents CORAM : HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE SURYA KANT. Present : Mr.J.S.Maanipur, Advocate, for the petitioners. Mr.Saurav Goel, Advocate, for the respondents. . -.- 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 seek quashing of the order dated 11.8.1993 (Annexure P-4) passed by the P.S.E.B. authorities whereby their request for change of option for refixation of their pay in the revised pay scales has been turned down primarily on the plea that as per Regulation 5 (I) of the Punjab State Electricity Board (Revised Pay) Regulations, 1988, such an option was required to be exercised by the petitioners within a period of four months from the date when the revised pay scales were introduced w.e.f. 1.1.1986. On the other hand, the case of the petitioners is that pursuant to the directions issued by this Court in Civil Writ Petition No.14760 of 1991 (Major Singh and others versus The Punjab State Electricity C.W.P.No .7329 of 1994 2 Board etc.) whereby the respondents were directed to consider the claim of the petitioners for the grant of benefit of higher qualifications with effect from the date of acquiring the higher qualifications or the date of joining, they have been granted the benefit of increments vide order dated 17.11.1992 (Annexure P-2) retrospectively. In other words, the claim of the petitioners is that once their pay has been favourably revised retrospectively, they are entitled to exercise the option for new pay scales afresh. The question as to whether in the circumstances noticed above an employee is entitled to exercise the option afresh, was firstly considered and answered in favour of the employes by the Division Bench of this Court in Daya Singh Mann versus State of Haryana and others (2005 (3) SCT 761) and following the same, this Court also in somewhat similar circumstances, in Civil Writ Petition No.6308 of 2009 (Kuldip Singh versus Punjab State Electricity Board and another) decided on 22.9.2010, held as follows:- “......Having heard learned counsel for the parties and after going through the records, I am of the considered view that this petition deserves to succeed for the obvious reason that during the pendency of the earlier inter-se litigation, the petitioner was placed in a lower pay scale and once his pay stood revised under the directions of this Court, the earlier option given by him would lose its significance and the petitioner would be entitled to seek a fresh option for re- fixation of his pay in the revised pay scale. Somewhat similar view has been taken by a Division Bench of this C.W.P.No .7329 of 1994 3 Court in Randhir Kaur and others versus State of Haryana and others (2003) (1) RSJ 178, after following the earlier decisions of this Court.......” For the reasons afore-stated, the writ petition is allowed; the impugned order dated 11.8.1993 (Annexure P-4) is hereby quashed and the respondents are directed to accept the fresh option that may be exercised by the petitioners, within a period of three months from the date of receiving a certified copy of this order. Dasti. January 13, 2011 (SURYA KANT) Mohinder JUDGE