IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA LPA No.83 of 2011 RAKESH KUMAR CHAUDHARY Versus THE STATE OF BIHAR & ORS ----------- 3 11-4-2011 Heard learned counsel for the appellant and learned counsel for the State. The appellant has preferred this appeal in his personal capacity by name although he was party to the writ petition only by designation of District Superintendent of Education, Gopalganj. The penultimate paragraph of the judgment and order of the writ court imposing cost of Rs.10,000/- upon the appellant is subject matter of this appeal. Learned counsel for the appellant submits that the writ petitioner has not disclosed all the relevant facts while raising her grievance that being a widow her compassionate appointment was being delayed in spite of recommendation by a Committee in her favour. It has further been submitted that some delay was caused because the matter was pending before the Regional Deputy Director of Education, Saran Division and hence cost has been imposed upon the appellant without there being any justification. 2 A perusal of the order under appeal shows that the learned writ court has appreciated the fact that for the delay in grant of compassionate appointment to the writ petitioner, the responsibility lay not only upon this appellant, still the cost appears to have been awarded specifically on the ground that the delay in filing of counter affidavit by the appellant for a period of more than two years led to the continued harassment of the writ petitioner. On this issue, learned counsel for the appellant submits that counter affidavit by Regional Deputy Director of Education or any other respondent was sufficient as counter- affidavit on behalf of State and hence non-filing of counter- affidavit at earlier stage by this appellant should not have been viewed so seriously. In order to appreciate this submission we have gone through the order-sheet of the writ case dated 7-11-2009 which reveals that the writ court noticed that petitioner’s husband had died on 26-5-2007 as an assistant teacher in a Govt. School at Gopalganj, but in spite of recommendation in her favour by the District Compassionate Appointment Committee the petitioner is running from pillar to post. In 3 that view of the matter it was mentioned in the order dated 7- 11-2009 to put up the case after three weeks within first five cases; Counsel for the State was to file counter-affidavit to show reason for non-issuance of appointment letter and the respondents were directed to issue appointment letter in favour of the writ petitioner before filing of the counter- affidavit and make statement to this effect in the counter- affidavit. The writ court has ultimately held that appointment matter was required to be processed at the district level where the appellant was incharge of the Department and in such circumstances the proceeding could have been concluded much earlier if either the appointment letter had been issued within three weeks or else a counter-affidavit had been filed at the level of the appellant disclosing the difficulties or the reasons for non-compliance with the interim order dated 7-11- 2009. A counter-affidavit ultimately came on behalf of appellant much later after issuance of notice for contempt. In the facts of the case, the issue that how much responsibility lay with the appellant for delay in compassionate appointment is not very relevant because the 4 writ court has found that delay in filing the counter-affidavit had also contributed to delay in disposal of the writ petition and thereby it had caused harassment to the writ petitioner. The appellant is not keen for reduction of amount of Rs.10,000/- rather he wants exoneration from the charge of delay in filing of the counter-affidavit which caused undue harassment to the writ petitioner. We are not in a position to accede to such prayer. There might not have been any intention of the appellant to cause harassment to the writ petitioner but the delay which is actually of about a year, in filing of the counter-affidavit caused delay in disposal of the writ petition and that was bound to cause harassment to the writ petitioner. Hence, we find no good ground to interfere in the matter on merits so as to exonerate the appellant completely. This appeal is therefore dismissed but the amount of cost is reduced to Rs. 1000/-(one thousand only). Naresh ( Shiva Kirti Singh, J.) ( Akhilesh Chandra,J)