After 23-year wait, HC admits 19-year delay in deciding appeal
Orders ex-gratia appointment, warns State with Rs 5 lakh cost
Expressing anguish over a 23-year-long wait in a service matter and nearly 19 years “unfortunately” taken to decide a pending appeal, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has directed the State to issue an appointment letter forthwith to a candidate. He had succeeded in a civil suit for ex-gratia appointment in 2006.
Justice Sudeepti Sharma also directed the State not compel him to initiate execution proceedings, while making it clear that failure to comply with the directions immediately would invite Rs 5 lakh cost to be paid to the applicant-candidate.
The Bench, during the course of hearing, was told that the candidate had filed a civil suit in 2003 seeking ex-gratia appointment after the death of his mother through adoption. She was at the time working in Gohana Veterinary hospital. His adoption was not held to be legal since his age at the time adoption deed’s registration was 16 years and six months.
The suit was decreed in his favour in 2006, and the State’s appeal was dismissed the same year. A regular second appeal was filed by the State the next year and the operation of the decree was stayed on March 2, 2007. The RSA remained pending since then.
“Vide order dated March 2, 2007, the execution of impugned judgment and decree was stayed. The present RSA pertains to the year 2007 and is now been decided after almost 19 years because of which the respondent is deprived of his right to be appointed on the post after death of his mother under the ex-gratia scheme,” the court observed.
In her detailed order, Justice Sharma recorded the court’s “pain and feelings” in such cases, where litigants in service matters were left waiting for decades despite decrees in their favour. “Before parting, this court would like to share its pain and feelings in such kind of cases where specially in service matters, litigants are waiting for the decision since long,” the court observed.
For preventing further delay and harassment to the respondent, the court asserted justice demanded the issuance of directions to the appellants that they should not force the respondent to file execution.
“This Court is well aware of the scope of decision in the RSA and that the courts cannot go beyond the relief prayed for in the civil suit. In such kind of cases, as in the present RSA, where the respondent filed the civil suit in the year 2003 for ex-gratia appointment and since then he has been waiting for his appointment, i.e., approximately for the last 23 years, and unfortunately this Court has taken almost 19 years to decide the RSA filed in the year 2007, the appellants are directed to issue the appointment letter to the respondent forthwith,” the Bench asserted.
