JUDGMENT :

SUNIL B. SHUKRE, J.

Heard.

2. Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith. Heard finally by consent of learned counsel for the respective parties.

3. It is submitted on behalf of the review petitioner that this is a case wherein fraud has been played upon the Court and therefore, the review petition deserves to be allowed. He relies upon the judgment of the Supreme Court rendered in the case of ‘S.P. Chengalvaraya Naidu (dead) by L.R.’s Vs. Jaganmath (dead) by L.R.s and Others”, AIR 1994 SC 853.

4. Learned counsel for the original petitioner submits that even though there is no mention about the earlier petition and the order passed therein on 12th September 2005, the fact remains that mother of the petitioner had sent a letter dated 7th November 2005, following the order dated 12th September 2005, to Indian Oil Corporation reminding it of the pendency of petitioner’s claim for providing of employment as per the policy of the Indian Oil Corporation and therefore, it could not be said that this is a case where fraud has been played upon the Court.

5. In order to examine the issue of fraud, it would be appropriate for this Court to consider as to what transpired in the earlier petition, which is reflected in the order dated 12th September 2005 delivered in Writ Petition No. 1787 of 2005 along with Writ Petition No. 2178 of 2005. For the sake of convenience, the order is reproduced as below:-

“This petition can be conveniently disposed of with liberty to the petitioners to approach the respondent – Corporation if there are vacancies in future. The petitions are accordingly disposed of”.

6. It would be clear from the order that the earlier petition filed by this petitioner along with his mother was not dismissed on any ground, rather it was disposed of by this Court with liberty to the petitioners to approach respondent-Corporation, if there was to arise any vacancy in future.

7. Considering such nature of order, we are of the view that nothing really turned on the fact of mentioning or not mentioning of earlier petition and it’s disposal by the order dated 12th September 2005. Things would have been different had the claim made on behalf of the petitioner vide his letter dated 7th November 2005 was expressly rejected by the Indian Oil Corporation as it’s rejection would have required the petitioner to challenge it and if the petitioner had not challenged it, the order sought to be reviewed here could not have been passed without setting aside that rejection. But, that is not the case here.

8. About the letter dated 7th November 2005, we must mention here that the petitioner has indeed mentioned about it in Para 10 of the original petition when he averred that his mother had sent a letter dated 7th November 2005 to the Indian Oil Corporation thereby reminding the Corporation to provide employment to the respondent no. 2. Although it is not clarified by the petitioner that this letter was in pursuance of the liberty granted by this Court in the earlier round of litigation, the inference is that it was so obviously, in view of the liberty granted to this petitioner and his mother. So, this is not a clear case of suppression of a material fact. Then, the Corporation, has not informed the petitioner in any manner about the fate of the letter dated 7th November 2005 sent to it by the mother of the petitioner. It was because of such attitude of the Corporation that petitioner was required to file the present petition. Such being the factual background of the writ petition, we do not think that there was suppression by petitioner of any such fact as would have had a material bearing upon the decision under review, and then it follows that there was no fraud played upon the Court. In order that the doctrine of fraud is applied, there must be suppression of facts or documents and those facts or documents must be so important and so material that in the absence of those facts or documents no effective decision could be made or if made, it would