CWP No.17803 of 2009 --1-- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH CWP No. 17803 of 2009 Date of decision : 5.04.2010 Balbir Singh ...Petitioner Versus Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Ltd. and others ...Respondents CORAM : HON'BLE MR.JUSTICE AJAY KUMAR MITTAL **** Present: Mr. Jagbir Malik, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Narender Hooda, and Mr. Parveen K Gupta, Advocates, for the respondents. **** AJAY KUMAR MITTAL, J. (ORAL) This judgment shall dispose of 14 writ petitions bearing Nos.17803, 17823, 17847 and 17848 of 2009, 494, 495, 498, 530, 534, 547, 548, 552, 561 and 565 of 2010 as common questions of law and fact are involved therein. However, for brevity, the facts are being taken from CWP No.17803 of 2009. The petitioner joined as T-Mate on work-charge basis on 1.3.1969 with the respondents and was regularised on 11.5.1979 as Assistant Lineman. He retired from the service of the respondent- Haryana Vidyut Parsaran Nigam Limited (in short 'the Nigam') on CWP No.17803 of 2009 --2-- 31.10.2006 upon attaining the age of superannuation. The petitioner is claiming that the period of his work-charge service be counted towards the total length of regular service for the purpose of granting him the retiral benefits, including pension. As per the averments made in the writ petition, the Board/Nigam had issued a circular letter dated 06.08.1993 (Annexure P-1) wherein it was provided that its employees would exercise their options within a period of three months from the date of their regularisation or from the date of issuance of the circular, whichever was later, as to whether he or she intended to count the period of work-charge service rendered by him/her towards pensionary benefits or intends to continue to be a member of EPF. Thereafter, another circular dated 9.8.1994 (Annexure P-2) for counting work-charge service for pensionary benefits was also issued wherein it was stated that the Haryana Government Notification No.1/2(55)-86-2 FR-II dated 4.2.1992 issued on the aforesaid subject was adopted by the Board/Nigam w.e.f. 9.1.1974. The grievance of the petitioner is that as these circulars were never got noted from him, he could not exercise any option for receiving the pensionary benefits. Therefore, the benefit of the policy decision should have been extended to him as well and he is prepared to surrender the employer's share of EPF with interest, as stipulated in the circular (Annexure P-1). Upon notice of motion, respondent Nos.1 to 5 filed written statement controverting the claim of the petitioner on the ground that the petitioner did not exercise the option in terms of the circular (Annexure P-1) within the given time despite its wide publication and now it has become a stale claim. CWP No.17803 of 2009 --3-- I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the record with their assistance. Learned counsel for the petitioner has placed reliance upon the judgment of the Hon'ble Apex Court in Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam V. Bachan Singh, Civil Appeal No.4903 of 2009 decided on 30.7.2009 (Annexure P-4) and a Single Bench decision of this Court in CWP No.17805 of 2009 (Bhunda Ram V. Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited and others) decided on 25.2.2010, whereby the controversy as involved in the present writ petition was settled by holding that as the instructions dated 6.8.1993 and 9.8.1994 were not got noted in writing from the employees to enable them to exercise their option for pension, the benefits derivable therefrom could not be denied to them. The learned counsel for the respondents does not dispute the aforesaid position. Consequently, the writ petitions are disposed of in terms of the judgment of the Hon'ble Apex Court in Bachan Singh's case (Supra) as well as that of this Court in Bhunda Ram's case (Supra). April 5, 2010 (AJAY KUMAR MITTAL) atulsethi JUDGE