IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA LPA No.407 of 2008 CENTRAL COALFIELDS LIMITED & ANR. Versus GANESH ENTERPRISES & ORS ----------- For the Appellants : Mr. V.M.K. Sinha, Advocate For the Respondents : Mr. Y.V. Giri, Senior Advocate Mr. Raju Giri, Advocate ---------------- P R E S E N T Hon'ble the Chief Justice & Hon'ble Mr. Justice Kishore K. Mandal --------- Dated, the 19th September, 2008. Appeal suffers from delay of 185 days. For condonation thereof, an application (I.A. No. 3364 of 2008) has been made. Even if, we condone the delay in filing the appeal, we are of the considered view that the appeal does not deserve to be admitted for more than one reason. 2. For one, the appellants challenged the impugned order dated 20th October, 2006 by filing Letters Patent Appeal (L.P.A. No. 929 of 2006). The said letters patent appeal was not found worth admission by the Division Bench. The order dated 9th February, 2007, whereby the appeal was dismissed by the Division Bench, reads thus: - “Mr. Vishwamohan Kumar Sinha, counsel appearing in support of the appeal states that the order stopping the supply of coal to respondents 1 and 2 was passed after giving them a notice and on consideration of their show cause. Further, the show - 2 - cause notice was given on the basis of an inspection of the units by the officers of the appellant- company. When it was pointed out to him that the judgment and order coming under appeal does not at all refer to any inspection made by the officers of the appellant-company or any notice given to the respondents on the basis of the inspection report and that the order of the writ court was based on the ground that the supply of coal to the respondents was stopped without any prior notice to them, he submitted that all those documents were part of the record before the writ court. If that be so, the appellant may move a petition for review before the learned Single Judge. This appeal is dismissed with the aforesaid observations.” 3. The Division Bench, thus, observed that the appellants may apply to the Single Judge for review of the order dated 20th October, 2006, but dismissed the appeal. A review application was filed by the present appellants before the Single Judge, which came to be dismissed by the Single Judge by an order dated 17th April, 2008. The order dated 17th April, 2008 reads thus: - Heard Mr. V.M.K. Sinha learned counsel appearing for the Central Coalfields limited and Mr. Y.V. Giri appearing for the respondents who were writ petitioners. Shri Sinha submits that being aggrieved by order of this Court as passed in the writ petition they had preferred a Letter patent appeal order whereof is annexed as annexure 1 to the review application. A reference to the said order would clearly show that the appellants therein (petitioners in this review application) argued that in fact notices were issued to the writ petitioners, inspections done prior to stopping the Coal Supplies and these facts were available in the writ proceedings but not noticed by the writ court. The letter patent bench then gave liberty to the present review petitioners to move this Court for review. Mr. Giri has appeared on behalf of the respondents and submits that after detailed hearing, the order was passed in Court in presence of all parties without any objection. He specifically states that before the order stopping coal supply was passed even as per - 3 - averments in the counter affidavit, no show cause or inspection was conducted by the respondent Coal Company. It was a general telex massage. To this shri. Sinha submits that he intended to submit before the LPA Bench that immediately after snapping /stopping supply notices were issued and inspection were made. In my view firstly such a thing was not argued at all and secondly again the stand has being taken before the letter patent bench is being changed before this Court in review. It was then further sought to be argued that the Coal supply having been snapped on the 30th of July, 2002 and the petitioners not having lifted coal for a period of one year thereafter the linkage snapped. I regret that this specifically was raised, considered and rejected by this Court following the judgment of Division Bench of Jharkhand High Court preceded over by the then Chief Justice dealing with the same telex message . In my view, all that the review petitioners want is to delay, and linger the matter on one pretext or the other and not implemented order of this Court. There can not be a second round of hearing in the same matter once after hearing the parties, detailed judgment was delivered in presence of parties. This review application is misconceived and is dismissed as such. 4. The Single Judge, thus, found no ground for reviewing the order dated 20th October, 2006. 5. The order dated 17th April, 2008 has not been challenged in the appeal, but instead, the original order dated 20th October, 2006 has been challenged against which the appeal had already been dismissed on 9th February, 2007. 6. For two, and more importantly, the stoppage of coal supplies to the respondents herein (original writ petitioners) was done without following the principles of natural justice in its right earnest. The inspection report of the State Government upon which - 4 - reliance has been placed related to the period when the coal supply had already been stopped by the present appellants. The enquiry report of the State Government, therefore, could not operate against the present respondents. 7. In our considered view, the consideration of the matter by the Single Judge cannot be said to suffer from any legal infirmity, justifying interference by us. 8. Letters patent appeal is, accordingly, dismissed in limine. 9. We, however, observe that if subsequent to the order dated 20th October, 2006 passed by the Single Judge, the coal policy of the Government of India has changed, then, obviously, the matter relating to supply of coal to the present respondents has to be considered under the new policy. However, while doing so, the restoration of coal supply to the respondents pursuant to the order dated 20th October, 2006 will be assumed and then as per policy existing now, decision of coal supply to the respondents would be taken by the appellants within one month from today. R. M. Lodha, CJ Kishore K. Mandal, J Pawan/-