IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA LPA No.1494 of 2009 1. BIHAR SCHOOL EXAMINATION BOARD through its Secretary, Sinha Library Road, Bihar, Patna 2. Chairman, Bihar School Examination Board, through its Secretary, Sinha Library Road, Bihar, Patna 3. Secretary, Bihar School Examination Board, through its Secretary, Sinha Library Road, Bihar, Patna …Respondents -Appellants Versus 1. MUSAFIR CHOUDHARY son of Late Jethu Choudhary, resident of Village Kalibigha, PS Giriyak, District Nalanda …Petitioner-Respondent 2. The State of Bihar through the Secretary, Energy Department, Bihar, Patna 3. The Chairman, Bihar State Electricity Board, Vidyut Bhawan, Bailey Road, Patna 4. The Secretary, Bihar State Electricity Board, Vidyut Bhawan, Bailey Road, Patna 5. The General Manager-cum-Chief Engineer, Central Electric Supply Area, Serpentine Road, Patna 6. Electric Supply Engineer, Electric Supply Circle, R Block, Patna ..Proforma Respondents- Respondents For the Appellants : Mr. Lalit Kishore, Sr. Advocate Mr. Satyabir Bharti, Advocate For Respondent no.1 : Mr. Y V Giri, Sr. Advocate Mr. B S Pandey, Advocate Mr. Ghanshyam Prasad, Advocate For Bihar State Electricity Board : Mr. Vinay Kirti Singh, Advocate ******** 09- 5/10/2010 This appeal under clause 10 of the Letters Patent of the High Court of Judicature of Patna raises a grievance with respect to the order dated 4.9.2009, passed by a learned single Judge of this Court in CWJC No.3103 of 2009, whereby the order of the appellants, countermanding its earlier order of correction of date of birth in favour of respondent no.1, has been set aside, 2 and it has been held that 1.3.1953 is his correct date of birth. The learned single Judge has also recorded the consequential order directing respondent nos. 3 to 7 to treat respondent no.1 in service accordingly. We shall go by the description of the parties occurring in the memo of appeal. 2. Operation of the order of the learned single Judge was stayed by order dated 12.5.2010, passed in the present appeal. Respondent no.1 herein filed IA no.6444 of 2010, praying therein that stay order dated 12.5.2010, may be vacated. The same has today been placed before us under the heading `For orders (on Petitions). Learned counsel for the parties submit in one voice that the matter may be taken up on merits and be finally disposed of instead of disposing of the interlocutory application alone. In view of the common prayer made by learned counsel for the parties, the appeal itself is taken on board `For Admission’ with a view to its final disposal. We have heard learned counsel for the parties at length. 3. A brief statement of facts essential for the disposal of the appeal may be indicated. 3 Respondent no.1 passed matriculation examination in April 1967. A photocopy of the Matriculation certificate issued by the appellant-Board in 1969 (Annexure 1), shows 1.3.1949 to be his date of birth. He joined the services of the Bihar State Electricity Board (hereinafter referred to as `the Board’), in 1978. 3.1 The case of respondent no.1, as set out in the writ petition, is that soon after he received his matriculation certificate in 1969, he realized that his date of birth is incorrectly recorded therein. He, therefore, submitted an application before the appellant –Board in 1970 for correction of his date of birth, stating therein that 1.3.1953 is his correct date of birth and correction may be made accordingly. His further case is that his application of 1970 suffered inaction. He, therefore, filed a fresh application in 1999. The same was rejected by order dated 29.4.2005, passed by the Secretary of the appellant-Board. Respondent no.1 thereafter filed another application on 23.5.2007. The same was considered and again rejected by order dated 1.6.2007, passed by the Secretary of the appellant- Board. Respondent no.1 filed a fresh application dated 4 19.5.2008, for correction of his date of birth which was also rejected by the Chairman of the appellant-Board by his order dated 4.2.2009. Respondent no.1 filed a fresh application on 5.2.2009, the very following day, which was allowed by the Chairman by his order dated 12.2.2009. The corrected certificate was issued on 21.2.2009. 3.2) The Electricity Board forwarded its communication dated 24.2.2009, to the appellant- Board, enquiring about the action taken by the latter in the matter of respondent no.1. The appellant-Board promptly replied by its letter dated 25.2.2009, communicating that the date of birth of respondent no.1 had been corrected in its records and is 1.3.1953. 3.3) This was followed by the impugned order, whereby the appellant-Board countermanded the order dt. 12.2.2009 of the Chairman, 1.3.1949 was restored as the date of birth of respondent no.1, and was duly notified in the newspaper of 1.3.2009. Hence this writ petition. 4. The learned single Judge has allowed the writ petition and held that respondent no.1 had filed his 5 application way back on 5.5.1970, which had been allowed by the Chairman by his order dated 12.2.2009, and was a correct decision. Therefore, the next order dated 27.2.2009, and the news item, are improper and fit to be set aside. The learned single Judge has further held that, in view of the position that the application of respondent no.1 was filed way back on 5.5.1970, the subsequent policy decision to the effect that no application for correction of date of birth can be entertained after ten years, is inapplicable to the present case. 5. Learned counsel for the appellants has submitted in support of the appeal that the first rejection order was passed in the year 2005, on the basis of objective considerations and was never challenged. His subsequent requests on two occasions were also rejected on the basis of objective findings as to suspicious cuttings and interpolations in the original records. Those orders were also not challenged. Apparently there are interpolations and cuttings in the admission register and TC Guard file. He further submits that respondent no.1 has not produced any 6 evidence either before the Board or before this Court that his date of birth is 1.3.1953. The onus to prove that the date of birth originally recorded was wrong is on him which he has failed to discharge. He further submits that, in any view of the matter, keeping in view the suspicious cuttings and interpolations in the date of birth found in the Admission Register and TC Guard file, this Court should not exercise the prerogative writ jurisdiction in favour of such a tainted person. He next submits that the correction is De Hors 2006 Policy of the Government. He lastly submits that in view of the aforesaid circumstances, there was no justification either in law or on facts for the order for change of date of birth, and the Board rightly reviewed the same and passed the impugned order. 6. Learned counsel for respondent no.1 has supported the order of the learned writ court, and submits that he had filed his first application for correction way back on 5.5.1970, which suffered inaction at the hands of the appellant-Board, and the order adverse to respondent no.1 was passed on 29.4.2005. The appellant-Board is, therefore, entirely 7 responsible for the delay in disposal of the application. He also submits that none of the adverse orders was ever communicated to respondent no.1, which alone fully justifies repeated applications by respondent no.1. He further submits that the appellants have not disclosed the basis on which the appellants had passed the order dated 27.2.2009. He also raises a grievance that the order dated 12.2.2009 was never published in the newspaper, but the appellants published the order countermanding it very promptly. He lastly submits that a series of adverse orders alleged to have been passed by the appellants were in violation of the principles of natural justice. 7. Learned counsel for the Electricity Board submits that respondent no.1 had joined its services way back in 1978, and he had certified the date of birth recorded therein by recording his signature. He next submits that, though respondent no.1 claims to have filed repeated applications before the appellants, but had never informed the Electricity Board of the attempts to have his date of birth corrected. 8. Learned counsel for the appellants has 8 produced before us the original records of the Middle School, Pawapuri, as well as the Admission Register of the Congress High School, Nasratpur, Nalanda, where respondent no.1 had received his education. He has also produced before us the original file maintained by the appellants in the routine course of business with respect to the subject matter in hand. The same have been made available to the learned counsel for the parties for their inspection and perusal. 9. We have perused the materials on record and considered the submissions of learned counsel for the parties. A photocopy of the original Matriculation certificate is on record which shows 1.3.1949 to be the date of birth of respondent no.1. It further shows that respondent no.1 had appeared at the matriculation examination in April 1967, and the certificate was issued in 1969. In other words, the petitioner had become aware way back in 1969 that 1.3.1949 was recorded as his date of birth in the Matriculation certificate. It further appears that respondent no.1 had thereafter pursued his higher studies, and ultimately joined the services of the Electricity Board in 1978. 9 The Electricity Board has in its counter affidavit in the writ proceeding clearly stated that 1.3.1949 is recorded in the service records, and has been duly certified by respondent no.1 to be his correct date of birth by recording his signature. The Electricity Board has althrough taken 1.3.1949 to be the date of birth of respondent no.1. The same had obviously found its way in all the original records of the educational institutions which he had joined for studies, and thereafter his service book maintained by the Electricity Board. In other words, respondent no.1 did not take any step from 1969 to 1999, to have his date of birth corrected in the records of the appellants. This strident back-ground appears to us to be insurmountable for respondent no.1. 10. We now pass on to the next aspect of the matter, namely, the efforts made by respondent no.1 to have his date of birth corrected. We have examined the original file maintained by the appellants in the routine course of business with respect to the subject matter in hand. It seems to be a systematically maintained file with proper pagination, and we have 10 not found the representation of 1970, or even its bare mention at any stage in the file. It is, therefore, very doubtful that he ever filed any application for correction way back in 1970. It appears that he never endeavoured to have it corrected till he was in a position to foresee his retirement and, therefore, made attempts to cover up the situation by devising a self- serving case that he had filed his application for correction way back in 1970. A brief reference of the application of 1970 is to be found at a much later stage, in one of his applications, when it became evident to him that the appellants had already rejected his application earlier and, therefore, he conjured the idea to mend the delay that he had filed his application way back in 1970. The original records create a clear impression in our minds that he had for the first time filed his application for correction in 1999, which was rejected by order dated 29.4.2005. It is, therefore, not possible to conclude that it suffered inaction at the hands of the appellants even between 1999 to 2005, inter alia, for the reason that the records disclose that the evidence furnished by him were inadequate, 11 reminders had been sent, and he had failed to comply with the directions substantially. We are convinced that these documents called for by the appellants from respondent no.1, while dealing with the application of 1999, his first application, have had a direct bearing on the question of redetermination of date of birth. After the adverse order of 29.4.2005, rejecting his application for correction of his date of birth, respondent no.1 indulged in undesirable activities. He pressed the appellants by his repeated applications tirelessly, which had on all the occasions to be rejected by the appellants which we say very rightly. 11. Learned counsel for respondent no.1 has made a grievance before us that the orders alleged to have been passed by the appellants rejecting the representations of respondent no.1, were never communicated to him, as a result of which he was not aware of the situation which led to repeated applications. This appears to be a blatant falsehood. It is obvious that all his applications were filed soon after the adverse orders were passed. It is obvious that he was keeping a very close track of the developments in 12 the office of the appellants and was filing application after application to the great harassment of the appellants. He would not stop till such time he would succeed. It appears that he did succeed when the Chairman of the appellant Board passed the order dated 12.2.2009, directing correction of the date of birth inspite of earlier rejections. He had passed this order on application of respondent no.1 of 5.2.2009. He had in the margin of this application made the following endorsement:- “Deputy Sec. (Correction) Admission register is in favour of the candidate. This case may be reopened to place before the Board or to take policy decision in this matter.” (Emphasis added) The Chairman’s direction was that the matter may be placed before the Board for reconsideration, but he himself passed the final order ignoring the Board, and ignoring all the earlier orders refusing to correct the date of birth. We are indeed very sorry at the attitude and approach of the Chairman, who seems to be playing in the hands of respondent no.1 for motives not disclosed before us. The Chairman should remind 13 himself that he should not play with public office and public duties, and has acted in a reprehensible manner. 12. We would like to review the entire situation on our own. The entire original records have been placed before us. It appears from a perusal of the same that respondent no.1 had initially joined Middle School, Pawapuri, Nalanda. The records maintained by the Middle School in the routine course of business shows that transfer certificate had been issued in favour of respondent no.1. There is sprinkling of water or chemical over the body of the certificate, defacing and defiling the same. This renders the entries made therein apocryphal. The same cannot be taken to give any benefit to respondent no.1. 12.1) It further appears that respondent no.1 had thereafter joined the Congress High School, Nasratpur, Nalanda, on 11.1.1963. It appears to be a High School. It is a fairly exhaustive register maintained in the routine course of business. The name of respondent no.1 appears at sl.no.35. It appears that column no.5 is headed “Date of Birth” (tUe frfFk). We find that the date of birth with respect to every 14 student is recorded at the top of the column. There was original entry with respect to respondent no.1 at the top of this column, which has by some contrivance been defaced and defiled. A crude attempt has been made to super-impose a fresh writing upon the defaced date of birth. The super imposed expression has nothing to do with the date of birth and is illegible. It has been noticed in one of the adverse orders passed by the appellants that it is quite enigmatic that the date of birth of respondent no.1 is recorded in the middle of this column, whereas the date of birth of every other candidate is at the top of the column. As stated earlier, the petitioner’s date of birth which was originally recorded, was indeed at the top of the column, and has been defaced. We are quite convinced that interference with the original records of the school are blatant, and obviously at the instance of respondent no.1. Who else was the beneficiary? 13. We have also been taken through the counter affidavit filed by the appellants in the writ court, and there were clear averment about the adverse entries, mutilation of records, and the like. None of the 15 same, nor the adverse orders passed against respondent no.1, have been noticed by the learned single Judge. The case set up by respondent no.1 (the writ petitioner) that he had filed the first application for correction of date of birth way back in 1970, has been taken for granted, without scrutiny of the relevant materials at all. We disagree with the order of the learned single Judge. 14. The litigant public should be mindful of the position that the Judicature established by the Constitution of India is meant for adjudication of bonafide disputes, and not disputes which are based on such blatant falsehood and interpolation of original records at the instance of frauds like the petitioner. Respondent no.1 has harassed the appellants no end, and has burdened this Court with most unwanted litigations. The time could have been well utilized for adjudication of bonafide disputes. We fail in our words to record our condemnation against respondent no.1. 15. In the result, this appeal is allowed. CWJC No.3103 of 2009 is dismissed. In the circumstances of the case, there shall be no order as to 16 costs. ( S K Katriar ) ( Birendra Prasad Verma ) mrl