Haradhan Majee vs The State Of West Bengal & Ors
2022 Latest Caselaw 1421 Cal

23.03.2022
 SL No. 57
Court No. 24
   (P.M)
                       In The High Court At Calcutta
                      Constitutional Writ Jurisdiction
                              Appellate Side

                                WPA 3473 of 2022

                                   Haradhan Majee
                                       Vs
                         The State of West Bengal & Ors.


                                 Mr. Lalratan Mondal,
                                 Mr. Avik Kr. Sadhu,
                                 Mr. Dilip Kumar Sadhu
                                                ... for the petitioner.

                                Mr. Tapan Kr. Mukherjee,
                                Ms. Sangeeta Roy
                                               ... for the State

                                Mr. Bhaskar Prasad Vaisya,
                                Mr. Nilay Baran Mondal
                                               ... for DPSC, Purulia



                      The petitioner was appointed as primary school

               teacher by the District Primary School Council in

               February, 1997. He joined school on 25th February, 1997

               and retired from service on attaining his normal age of

               superannuation on 31st August, 2005.

                      As the petitioner did not achieve the minimum

               qualifying service period he was not paid any pension.

                      The petitioner filed a representation before the

               respondent authorities and served the same through

post on 25th February, 2021. The petitioner filed the

present writ petition on 24th February, 2022 praying for

a direction upon the respondent authorities to consider

his representation and to grant pension by condoning

the shortfall in the qualifying service period.

The petitioner submits that he was serving as an

organizer teacher in the school from the year 1972. An

interview was called for appointment of primary school

teacher in the year 1988 and a panel was prepared. The

panel was approved in the year 1997 and thereafter the

appointment letter was issued in his favour.

The petitioner submits that the period for which

he worked as organizer teacher prior to his regular

appointment in 1997 be taken into consideration for the

purpose of assessing his tenure of service.

It appears from the submissions made on behalf

of the petitioner and from the documents annexed to the

writ petition that after his retirement in the year 2005

the petitioner never raised any issue regarding non-

granting of pension in his favour. It is only in the year

2021 that the petitioner approached the authorities for

the first time with a prayer for grant of pension upon

condoning the shortfall in the qualifying service period.

There is no explanation whatsoever in the writ petition

as to why the petitioner approached the Court after such

a long time and why the petitioner never approached the

authority in proper time.

It appears that the petitioner relies upon several

judgments passed by this Court in similar matters where

direction was given for condoning the shortfall in the

qualifying service period of the incumbent.

In the present case, the petitioner has not come

forward with any case which permits condonation of the

shortfall in the qualifying service period. Moreover, the

petitioner has approached this Court nearly seventeen

years after his retirement.

The prayer of the petitioner, accordingly, cannot

be accepted by the Court. There is inordinate

unexplained delay in filing the writ petition.

The Court does not find any reason to interfere in

the present case.

Writ petition fails and is hereby dismissed.

Urgent photostat certified copy of this order, if

applied for, be given to the parties on completion of

usual formalities.

(Amrita Sinha, J.)