IN THE PUNJAB & HARYANA HIGH COURT AT CHANDIGARH CIVIL WRIT PETITION 4782 of 2005 DATE OF DECISION :July 21 ,2008 Narinder Dev Singla ....Petitioner Versus Regional Provident Fund Commissioner & another ....Respondents CORAM : HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE HEMANT GUPTA HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE AJAY TEWARI Present: Mr.O.P.Batra, Advocate, for the petitioner Mr.Rajiv Sharma, Advocate, for respondent No.1 Ms.Geeta Singhwal, Advocate, for respondent No.3 AJAY TEWARI , J The short point which arises for decision in the present case is whether the pension of the petitioner could be reduced without affording him an opportunity of hearing. The petitioner joined service as a Field Officer with the Haryana State Co-operative Supply and Marketing Federation Limited- respondent No.3 on 06-04-1976 and retired on super annuation on 30-04- 2004. Vide order dated 28-05-2004/04-06-2004, respondent No.1 fixed the pension of the petitioner at Rs.1125/-per month. Subsequently, by order dated 22-02-2005, the pension of the petitioner was reduced to Rs.979/-and an order of recovery of Rs.1378/-(upto 31-01-2005) was issued which has been challenged by way of present petition. In reply, it has been urged that the services of the petitioner were terminated and later he was reinstated and for that period, he remained CWP 4782 of 2005 --2-- out of service . No wages had been paid to him and, thus, he made no contribution towards Employees Contributory Provident Fund. Be that as it may, it is not disputed that no notice or opportunity of hearing was granted to the petitioner before the impugned order was passed reducing his pension and directing recovery . The impugned order is, thus, liable to be set aside on this short ground. Consequently, the impugned order is set aside while granting opportunity to the respondents to pass a fresh order after issuing notice to the petitioner and granting him an opportunity of hearing. Disposed of in the above terms. Sd/- [Ajay Tewari] Judge sd/- [Hemant Gupta] Judge July 21,2008 *MandeepKaur*