Orissa High Court: S.K Panigrahi, J. dismissed the petition and remarked “no application for alteration of date of birth after five years from the joining date will be entertained.”
The instant writ petition was filed for correction of the date of birth from 01-02-1963 to 01-02-1965 which was wrongly recorded in the petitioner’s service book entry. The petitioner is currently employed as a peon in the Dinapadma High School, Baghamund, in the district of Bolangir and has made representations that his date of birth has been wrongly recorded.
Counsel for the petitioner submitted that if the date of birth of the petitioner is not subjected to correction within the optimal amount of time, then the petitioner will face the problem of premature retirement and irreparable loss & injury.
A notification (No.2102 – 2R/1-27/94-Gen) issued by the Government of Orissa dated 30th January, states
“(i) No alternation of the date of birth once recorded in the Service Book/Service Roll of an employee, shall be made excepting in case of clerical error without prior approval of the State Government. An application for effecting a change in the date of birth shall be summarily rejected if a) filed after five years of entry into Government service, or b) the change would lower the applicant’s age to an extent that he/she would have been ineligible to appear in any of the academic or recruitment examination for appointment to any service or post under the Government.”
The Court relied on the Supreme Court judgment named Secretary and Commissioner, Home Department v. R. Kirubakaran, AIR 1993 SC 2647 wherein it was observed
“…….As such whenever an application for alteration of the date of birth is made on the eve of superannuation or near about that time, the court or the tribunal concerned should be more cautious because of the growing tendency amongst a section of public servants to raise such a dispute without explaining as to why this question was not raised earlier…….”
“An application for correction of the date of birth by a public servant cannot be entertained at the fag end of his service. It need not be pointed out that any such direction for correction of the date of birth of the public servant concerned has a chain reaction, inasmuch as others waiting for years, below him for their respective promotions are affected in this process.
“the court must be fully satisfied that there has been real injustice to the person concerned and his claim for correction of date of birth has been made in accordance with the procedure prescribed, and within time fixed by any rule or order. The onus is on the applicant to prove about the wrong recording of his date of birth in his service book.”
The Court thus noted that the application is time-barred and was not filed within five years from the date of joining. In the instant case, according to the notification it was made clear that no alteration of the entry should be allowed after five years.
The Court held “petitioner’s claim is time-barred and hence, cannot be entertained.”[Ugrasen Sahu v. State of Odisha, 2022 SCC OnLine Ori 1468, decided on 27-05-2022]
Appearances
For Petitioners: Ms D.J. Sahu
For Opp. Parties: Mr Biswajit Mohanty