The Allahabad High Court observed that long pendency of the writ petition filed by an applicant cannot be the sole reason to deny compassionate appointment to him/her.

The Petitioner sought appointment on compassionate grounds following the death of his mother, who was serving as an Assistant Teacher. The petitioner's initial application for compassionate appointment was not considered, leading to a court petition. Despite the court's direction to reconsider the petitioner's claim, it was subsequently rejected based on allegations of forged educational documents regarding the petitioner's mother's appointment.

A Bench of Justice Saurabh Shyam Shamshery held, “long pendency of a petition before this Court may not be considered to be adverse for petitioner’s claim, therefore, a legitimate claim of petitioner for compassionate appointment cannot be denied only on ground that this writ petition remains pending before this Court for almost 9 years.”

Advocate Amit Singh appeared for the Petitioner and Standing Counsel for State Tej Bhan Singh appeared for the Respondents.

The petitioner's counsel argued that his mother had served for about 15 years without any adverse remarks, and the documents provided by the opposing party were never verified during her lifetime. Conversely, the respondents contended that the petitioner's mother's appointment was based on forged documents.

The Court found that the information provided by the opposing party was not independently verified by the respondents, and no adverse order was passed against the petitioner's mother during her lifetime. The Court added, “In a case where fraud is alleged, it is a legal obligation upon the respondents to verify it by their own means and to confront it with delinquent employee, however, in present case, admittedly information supplied by one Ashish Kumar Gupta was not verified by their own means as well as that during lifetime of employee, she was never confronted with any allegation of fraud, even no notice was issued to her, therefore, the allegations against deceased employee remain unverified, therefore, no adverse order could be passed. In these circumstances, respondents have committed an illegality by rejecting claim of petitioner on frivolous ground, therefore, impugned order could not survive and accordingly set aside.”

Consequently, the Court concluded that the rejection of the petitioner's claim was unlawful.

In order to decide the issue of as to whether the case of petitioner could be considered for compassionate appointment even after lapse of more than 10 years the Court reproduced the paragraphs of a Apex Court judgment in State of West Bengal Vs. Debabrata Tiwari and Others, 2023 SCC OnLine SC 219.

The Court noted that the petitioner had promptly pursued his claim, and the long pendency of the case before the court should not be a reason to deny the claim. The Court added, “The outcome of aforesaid observation is that petitioner’s claim may still be considered for compassionate appointment. The petitioner has taken prompt endeavour to approach this Court. There is no delay on part of petitioner, therefore, this writ petition is disposed of with an observation that in peculiar circumstances, petitioner’s case still be considered for compassionate appointment in accordance with relevant rules and provisions and shall not be rejected only on ground of delay, however, petitioner has to place material about his hardship as held in Debabrata Tiwari and Others (supra).”

Cause Title: Vivek Kumar v. State of U.P. & Anr., [2024:AHC:52096]

Appearance:

Petitioner: Advocates Prem Narayan Tiwari, Amit Singh, Ashish Kumar Srivastava, Ashutosh Kumar Yadav, Shiva Kant Srivastava, Suresh Chandra Yadav

Respondents: Advocates Tej Bhan Singh and Mrigraj Singh

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Allahabad High CourtJustice Saurabh Shyam Shamshery

Suchita Shukla