1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA. CWP No.361 of 2003 Decided on.25.9.2008 H.P.T.D.C Ltd & another …Petitioners Versus Kesari Devi & others …Respondents Coram The Hon’ble Mr. Justice R.B. Misra, J. The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Surjit Singh, J. Whether approved for reporting ?1. For the petitioners : Mr. Mohan Singh, Advocate.. For the respondents Mr. B.S. Verma, Advocate. Per Surjit Singh, J (Oral) By means of this writ petition, petitioners have sought judicial review of order dated 19th December, 2002 of H.P. State Administrative Tribunal, passed in OA No. 1855 of 1998, whereby allowing the OA filed by deceased Hira Lal, now represented by his legal representatives ( respondents herein), a direction has been issued to the writ petitioners to treat deceased Hira Lal as having retired from service as waiter on completion of age of 60 years, to be counted from his actual date of birth, i.e. 24th March, 1939, and not from the date recorded in his service record, i.e. 24th March, 1937,and to give him all consequential retiral benefits. The aforesaid 1 Whether the reporters of Local Papers may be allowed to see the judgment? Yes. 2 order of the Tribunal is alleged to be patently illegal and as such not sustainable in law. 2. Relevant facts may be summed up thus. Deceased Hira Lal was appointed as waiter, on the establishment of the writ petitioner, on 14.3.1978. In his service record, his date of birth was recorded as 24th March, 1937. Seniority lists of waiters were circulated twice, once in the year 1990 and second time in the year 1994 and the dates of birth of waiters were mentioned in the said seniority lists. The date of birth of deceased Hira Lal was mentioned as 24th March, 1937, in both the lists. Hira Lal was retired from service, on attaining the age of 60 years, which was counted by taking his date of birth to be 24th March, 1937. He did not object to his retirement which took place on 31.3.1997. It appears from the record that deceased Hira Lal used to contribute to provident fund in his capacity as an employee of the writ petitioner-corporation. After his retirement, Commissioner, Provident Fund was approached to release the money, due to him in his provident fund account. The Commissioner, Provident Fund, vide communication dated 23rd September, 1997 addressed to Hira Lal, pointed out that as per record available in his office, his date of birth was 24th March, 1939, but in form 10-D submitted for payment of money outstanding in the account, the date of birth was recorded as 24th march, 1937. It was thereafter that late Hira Lal started asserting that his date of birth was 24th March, 3 1939. He made no representation to the writ petitioner and straightaway filed Original application before the State Administrative Tribunal in the year 1998. Learned Tribunal sent for the service record of Hira Lal and observed that his date of birth in the service book has been changed by over- writing and that over written date was 24th March, 1937. However, the tribunal did not make any observation as to whether the date originally written was legible or not and if it was legible what that date was. Only because of the observation that the date of birth had been over written, the tribunal allowed the Original application and directed the writ petitioner to treat deceased Hira Lal having retired on completion of age of 60 years considering his date of birth to be 24th March, 1939. 3. We have heard learned counsel for the parties and gone through the record. Admittedly, late Hira Lal never raised any objection with regard to his date of birth which was recorded as 24th March, 1937 not only in the service record, but also in the two seniority lists circulated in the years 1990 and 1994 when he was in service. Not only this, he did not object to his retirement w.e.f. 31st March, 1997 which was effected by treating his date of birth as 24th March, 1937. We have been told during the course of hearing of the matter that late Hira Singh was a matriculate. That means he was supposed to be in the know of his date of birth. Had the year of his birth been 1939, he being an educated man, was 4 supposed to have objected to his retirement in the year 1997, when he had still not attained the age of superannuation. He having not done so, indicates that the year of his birth was 1937 to his kn owledge. Otherwise also, a government employee or an employee of an organization funded and controlled by the government, cannot be allowed to dispute his date of birth at the fag end of his career. Law is well settled on the point. Recently, a Division Bench of this court, comprising both of us has held so in CWP No. 185/2004 State of HP and others Vs. Karam Singh, decided on 21.8.2008. The present case is worse than the case of an employee seeking change in the date of birth at the fag end of his career, inasmuch as the change was sought more than a year after the retirement of the employee. 4. Under these circumstances, we are of the considered view that the order of the State Administrative Tribunal is bad in law and hence not sustainable. Consequently, the present writ petition is allowed and the order of the Tribunal is set aside. No order as to costs. ( R.B. Misra ), J. ( Surjit Singh ), J. 25th Sept, 2008 (sl)