IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No. 9020 of 1987 Date of decision: 2nd December, 2008 Sant Singh and another … Petitioners Versus State of Punjab and others … Respondents CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA Present: None for the petitioners. Mr. Satish Bhanot, Senior DAG Punjab for the State. Mr. Amit Sethi, Advocate for respondent No.2 to 4. KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA, J. (ORAL) Sant Singh and Babar Singh, petitioners have approached this Court seeking quashing of orders dated 19th October, 1987 (Annexure P-9 and P-9/1) passed by the respondent – Corporation, whereby increments granted to them during the period of training have been cancelled and recovery from their salaries has been ordered, as a result of cancellation of such increments. Mr.Amit Sethi appearing for the respondent – Corporation has very fairly admitted that there was no misrepresentation on the part of the petitioners and inadvertently, the increments were granted to them during the period when they were candidate Zilladars and according to Mr.Sethi, the increments were given in the year 1981 and 1982. The lapse by the Corporation was noticed in the year 1987 vide Annexure P-9 and P-9/1, when recovery was ordered. Civil Writ Petition No. 9020 of 1987 Present writ petition was filed in year 1987. Period of more than 26 years is going to elapse when the increments were awarded to the petitioner. It is not disputed that thereafter, petitioners have been absorbed in State service. It was held in Sahib Ram v. The State of Haryana and others, 1995 Supreme Court Cases Suppl. (1) 18, that when there is no misrepresentation on the part of the employee, the recovery cannot be effected. It was also held in Purshottam Lal Das and others v. The State of Bihar and others in Appeal (Civil) 4386 of 2006 decided on 10th October, 2006 that recovery may not be just, where there is no misrepresentation on the part of the employee. In Babulal Jain v. State of M.P. and others, 2007 (4) SLR 123, Hon'ble Apex Court has further held that where the candidate has not committed any fraud or misrepresentation, recovery ought not to be effected. Consequently, the present writ petition is allowed to the limited extent that no recovery, as stated in Annexures P-9 and P-9/1 be effected from the petitioners. [KANWALJIT SINGH AHLUWALIA] JUDGE December 2, 2008 rps 2