ORDER :

1. The petitioners are either serving, retired government servants or their successors and since the recovery has been ordered to be effected from them or their predecessors, they have approached this Court for quashing of such recoveries.

2. When these cases were taken up for hearing, the parties were ad idem that before proceeding to decide each case individually, the Court should lay down certain broad guidelines under which recoveries by the employers would be permissible/impermissible in law.

3. The principles for allowing recovery of over payments are well laid down through series of judgments of the Hon’ble Supreme Court. The earlier view that such recoveries should not be permitted unless over payment can be attributed to fraud or misrepresentation on part of the employee, has undergone major changes.

4. In case of Col. B.J. Akkara (Retd.) vs. Government of India and Others, (2006) 11 SCC 709, it was observed as under:

“28. Such relief, restraining recovery back of excess payment, is granted by courts not because of any right in the employees, but in equity, in exercise of judicial discretion, to relieve the employees, from the hardship that will be caused if recovery is