Pension is a deferred compensation for past services and a statutory right that can only be deprived in accordance with the law.

JUDGMENT :

The petitioner retired while holding the rank of Superintending Engineer in Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) with effect from 30.04.2017. In the present application filed on 28.032018, the petitioner has sought for a direction to the respondents to pay his post retiral dues. It has been specifically asserted in the writ application that till the date of the filing of the writ application, not even a single penny has been paid to him against post retiral dues, despite the fact that there was no department proceeding ever initiated, against the petitioner.

2. The present case was heard online through video conference, during the course of which Mr. Kunal Tiwary, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Prasoon Sinha, with Prabhakar Singh, learned counsel, representing the Patna Municipal Corporation made their extensive arguments on behalf of the rival parties.

3. A counter affidavit and a supplementary counter affidavit have been filed on behalf of the Corporation. The petitioner has filed reply to the counter affidavit. A counter affidavit has also been filed on behalf of the State of Bihar.

4. Briefly narrated, the case of the petitioner is that after his appointment as Assistant Engineer in Patna Water Board in 1983, he was granted promotion to the post of Chief Engineer of the Board, which is equivalent in rank to the post of Executive Engineer in the Government. At the said point of time, the Patna Water Board was part of Patna Municipal Corporation. The petitioner, it has been asserted was granted promotion to the post of Chief Engineer of the Board ( equivalent to Executive Engineer in the Government) on the recommendation of the Bihar Public Service Commission vide office order as contained in Memo No. 1895 dated 01.11.1996. Patna Municipal Corporation, Patna Regional Development Authority and the Board were decided to be merged by the State Government in the year 2006 and three posts equivalent to the post of Superintending Engineers under the State Government were created, which were to be filled up by granting promotion to the Engineers working in the Corporation. Kalawadhi of eight years was prescribed for promotion to the rank of Superintending Engineer from the rank of Executive Engineer and the petitioner having completed the said Kalawdhi was entitled to be considered for upgradation of his status to the rank of Superintending Engineer of the State Government. Before the petitioner’s case could be considered for promotion, he was diagnosed suffering from cancer for which, with permission of the authority, he had left to the United States of America for proper medical treatment and he remained there from April 2010 to September, 2010. Apart from the difficulties, which arose in respect of the payment of regular salary after the petitioner rejoined the post on return from USA, he has asserted that as the respondents were not considering his case for promotion, he had to approach this Court invoking writ jurisdiction with filing of an application, which had given rise to CWJC No. 15242 of 2012. The said writ application was disposed of by an order dated 05.10.2012 with a direction to the Corporation to consider his case for promotion to the next sanctioned post equivalent to the Superintending Engineer in the Government for which the petitioner was eligible since 2004. The petitioner, however, started getting salary from the month of August, 2012. It is the petitioner’s case that the petitioner was not paid his salary from the month of April, 2010 to July, 2012 and August, 2014. This made the petitioner file another writ application, giving rise to CWJC No. 6014 of 2014, seeking direction for payment of salary for the said period(s). It has also been asserted that the petitioner had filed a writ application, bearing CWJC No. 6014 of 2017 on 08.04.2017. It is his grievance that as counter blast of the filing of the writ application, the respondents issued show cause notice on 20.04.2017, which was served o