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: State's '' Assertion Must Be Verified Against Own Earlier Admission
Court Refuses to Accept State's '' Claim
A division bench of the , , comprising Justice Shekhar B. Saraf and Justice Abdhesh Kumar Chaudhary, has held that when the State asserts that no dues remain outstanding after a fresh verification, a is not bound to accept that claim . Instead, the court must independently cross-check the amounts released against the department's own earlier admission of liability.
The judgment, delivered on , arose from five connected writ petitions filed by and related firms—all run by members of a single family from Chilwarya village in Bahraich district. The firms had supplied food packets for block-level teacher training programmes conducted by the during and .
The Dispute: Unpaid Bills and Contradictory Figures
The petitioners claimed that despite completing supplies through the and submitting invoices, payments were stalled due to technical glitches in the and lapse of funds. After a first round of litigation, the passed an order on , admitting a much lower amount than claimed—Rs. 14,15,896 against a claim of Rs. 35,02,521 in the leading case.
Aggrieved, the petitioners moved the High Court again, arguing that the Director had arbitrarily ignored supporting reports from . They sought a for payment of the full claimed amounts plus 18% interest.
State's Defence and Subsequent Verification
The respondents countered that the bills were disputed and that a fresh block-level verification exercise conducted during the pendency of the petitions had determined the exact liability. By a letter dated , the , declared that the outstanding balance against all petitioner firms stood at "NIL", implying that all verified dues had been paid.
However, when the court compared the amounts released against the department's own admitted figures in the impugned order, it found significant discrepancies. In two of the five petitions—Writ-C No. 2151/2026 () and Writ-C No. 2153/2026 ()—the sums released fell short of what the department itself had admitted as payable, by Rs. 10,45,791 and Rs. 1,19,544 respectively.
Court's Approach: Splitting the Claim
The High Court adopted a . It held that the admitted —being a figure recorded in the department's own order—required no factual adjudication and could be enforced through a . The over that admitted amount, however, involved genuinely contested questions of fact that could not be resolved on affidavits alone.
"Such a fact situation, where even the writ petitioners themselves are not
as to what constitutes the admitted dues, and where the figures placed by the State authorities have oscillated at different stages of the proceedings, is a quintessential example of a dispute that cannot be resolved on the basis of affidavits and counter-affidavits, and would necessarily require a
,"
the court observed.
Precedents Applied
The bench relied on the 's decisions in , , and to conclude that writ courts are not forums for adjudicating involving . The exception carved out in was held inapplicable because the present case did not involve a clear admission of liability.
The court also noted that the right to interest, as established in and , arises only after the is firmly determined. Since the remained unresolved, no interest could be awarded on that portion.
Key Observations
The court expressed strong displeasure at the State's shifting stance, noting that the conduct of the respondent authorities
"has also not been above board."
It observed:
"It is precisely to guard against such unilateral and self-serving assertions of 'NIL' liability that this Court has thought it necessary to independently verify the respondents' own figures against their own prior admission, rather than accepting the letter dated 11.05.2026."
On the admitted , the court stated:
"Thisis not, in any sense, a disputed figure requiring evidence; it is the respondents' own departmental admission, recorded in their own order, which admittedly remains unpaid even as on date, despite the very verification exercise the respondents have relied upon."
Final Directions
The court directed the respondents to release the admitted amounts—Rs. 10,45,791 in Writ-C No. 2151/2026 and Rs. 1,19,544 in Writ-C No. 2153/2026—within two months, along with from till actual payment.
In the remaining three petitions, where the amounts released exceeded or matched the admitted figures, no further direction was issued. However, the respondents were left free to recover any excess paid.
The petitioners' prayer to quash the impugned order and obtain the higher claimed amounts was rejected. They were for adjudication of the , with the benefit of .
The judgment underscores the limits of writ jurisdiction in contractual disputes and reinforces the principle that courts will not permit the State to avoid its own by resorting to belated and .
