R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH C.M. No. 3203-C of 2009 and R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 Date of Decision: 9.3.2009 State of Haryana ...Appellant. Versus Ramesh Chander Arora ...Respondent. CORAM:- HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE AJAY KUMAR MITTAL. PRESENT: Mr. Imma Singh Kang, DAG, Haryana for the appellant. **** AJAY KUMAR MITTAL, J. This regular second appeal filed by defendant No.1 is directed against the judgment and decree dated 16.10.2008 passed by the District Judge, Rohtak, affirming that of the Civil Judge (Junior Division), Rohtak dated 24.12.2007, whereby the suit of the plaintiff for declaration with consequential relief of mandatory injunction was decreed. Sans unessentials, the facts as per the plaintiff are that he joined as Sub Divisional Officer on 25.10.1972 and was promoted as Executive Engineer on 24.6.1995. His date of superannuation was 28.2.2003 but he was removed from service on 21.1.2003 on baseless R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 -2- allegations. It was pleaded that the plaintiff moved a representation dated 21.3.2003 to defendant No.5 for withdrawal of his General Provident Fund amount from his GPF Account No. 268942 and received a letter dated 31.3.2003 for submitting his specimen signatures and original copy of GPF account statement and the needful was done. Thereafter, again vide letter dated 11.11.2003, the plaintiff was asked to submit the original GPF statement and the same was sent to defendant No.5 vide letter dated 25.11.2003. It was further pleaded that on failure by defendant No.5 to redress the request of the plaintiff, he made the representation dated 20.10.2004 to defendant No.4 which was further sent to defendant No.2 for appropriate action. According to the plaintiff, on 25.2.2005, he received a letter from the Accountant General, Haryana, Chandigarh asking him to contact the Drawing and Disbursing Officer for the receipt of the GPF amount but when he approached defendants No.4 and 5, no payment was made to him. Thereafter, he served a legal notice dated 31.8.2005 under Section 80 of the Code of Civil Procedure on the defendants which also failed to evoke any positive result and that gave rise to the filing of the suit for declaration to the effect that withholding of his GPF amount was illegal and arbitrary and, therefore, the defendants be directed to pay the same along with interest at the rate of 24% p.a. To controvert the claim of the plaintiff, the defendants filed a joint written statement wherein various preliminary objections were raised. It was pleaded that the amount of GPF had already been released to the plaintiff vide demand draft dated 27.4.2006. It was further pleaded that the recoveries of Rs.14,34,035/- and Rs.17,868/- R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 -3- were outstanding against the plaintiff and he was also facing two departmental enquiries. In one enquiry, he was found guilty and removed from the service whereas the other enquiry was going on. According to the defendants, due to heavy recoveries, the settlement of account of GPF for final withdrawal was not possible without making the loss good and vide letters dated 21.3.2002 and 11.11.2003, the GPF statements for the years 2001-2002 and 2002-2003 were requisitioned from the plaintiff. The other averments made in the plaint were denied and a prayer for dismissal of the suit was made. The trial court on appreciation of the oral as well as the documentary evidence led by the parties, vide judgment and decree dated 24.12.2007, decreed the suit of the plaintiff holding that the plaintiff was entitled to interest on account of withholding of GPF amount and was granted interest at the rate of 12% per annum from May, 2005 till actual date of the payment, i.e. 27.4.2006. Feeling aggrieved, the defendant-State filed an appeal before the lower appellate court which vide judgment and decree dated 16.10.2008 affirmed the findings recorded by the trial court and dismissed the appeal. I have heard the learned counsel for the appellant-State and have perused the impugned judgments with his assistance. The lower appellate court while dismissing the appeal of the State, in para 13, had noticed as under:- “The contention of the learned Govt. Pleader that the learned trial Court should have taken into account the instructions issued by the Finance Department at the R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 -4- time of awarding of interest at the rate of 12% per annum does not hold good because it was the responsibility of the department to have paid interest. In the case in hand admittedly on 25.5.2005, a letter was issued by the Accountant General of Haryana conveying the respondent to contact the Drawing and Disbursing Officer for payment of his GPF amount. The amount was again withheld till 27.4.2006 for the reasons best known to the department. In this situation, the learned trial Court has rightly awarded the interest at the rate of 12% per annum from 25.5.2005 to 27.5.2006. The another factor which weighed with the learned trial Court was that the respondent in-fact was compelled to approach the Civil Court for the redressal of his grievances. Besides this, in a similar suited case in Re Gorakhpur University Versus Dr. Shitla Prasad Negendra 2001 (3) Labour and Services Judicial Reports 383, the Hon'ble Apex Court had imposed interest at the rate of 18% per annum on the authority for delay in making the payment of retiral benefits. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the learned trial Court has not gone wrong in awarding interest at the rate of 12% per annum to the respondent. I, therefore, see no illegality and infirmity into the findings rendered by the learned trial Court on issue No.1 and the same R.S.A. No. 1101 of 2009 -5- are, thus, affirmed.” No illegality or perversity could be pointed out in the concurrent findings recorded by the courts below warranting interference by this Court in the regular second appeal. The plaintiff was rightly held entitled to claim interest on the delayed payment of the GPF amount, as the same was not attributable to him. Thus, no question of law, much less a substantial question of law arises in this appeal for determination of this Court. Finding no merit in this appeal, the same is hereby dismissed. There shall, however, be no order as to costs. Since the appeal has been dismissed on merits, no separate order is being passed in C.M. No. 3203-C of 2009 for condonation of delay in filing the appeal and the application is disposed of as such. March 9, 2009 (AJAY KUMAR MITTAL) gbs JUDGE