Hon'ble Attau Rahman Masoodi, J.—Heard Sri Ravi Prakash Gupta, learned counsel for the petitioner and Sri Kirti Kar Tripathi learned counsel for opposite party No. 3.

2. This writ petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India has questioned the correctness of the judgement/order passed by the Controlling Authority in P.G. No. 19 of 2010 on 8.12.2015 whereby the claim of opposite party No. 3 for payment of gratuity to the tune of Rs. 45498/- alongwith 9% simple interest in the event of default to make the payment within a period of thirty days, was allowed.

3. The judgment/order passed by the Controlling Authority under Section 7 of the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972, on being appealed before the appellate authority, has met with the fate of rejection by judgement and order dated 27.1.2017. Hence, this writ petition.

4. At the very outset, this Court is informed that the Act No. 47 of 2009 i.e. Payment of Gratuity Amendment Act, 2009 has already come to be challenged on the aspect of its validity before the Apex Court and the proceedings are pending. The issue of the length of service for which the payment of gratuity would be admissible is also said to be engaging attention of the Apex Court. Thus, while deciding the present writ petition, this Court has to bear the above-mentioned factual position in mind. This Court would note that the admissibility of gratuity to a teacher w.e.f. 3.4.1997 in terms of the Amendment Act, 2009 under no order passed by the Apex Court is shown to have been put on hold.

5. On coming to the validity of the impugned judgement/order in the present case, Sri Gupta learned counsel for the petitioner has essentially raised the issue of jurisdiction of the Controlling Authority to entertain the dispute as well as the procedure according to which the proceedings initiated, if any, are to be dealt with.

6. On the jurisdictional aspect, the contention put-forth by learned counsel for the petitioner is to the effect that unless a dispute is raised before the employer within the meanings of Section 7(1) of the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972, it would not be open to an aggrieved person to avail the remedy before the Controlling Authority straightaway.

7. The second submission put-forth by Sri Gupta learned counsel for the petitioner is to the effect that the Controlling Authority exercises the powers of an adjudicatory body and several provisions of Civil Procedure Code are made applicable for regulating the proceeding. Referring to Section 7 (5) of the Payment of Gratuity Act, it is canvassed that once the Controlling Authority is empowered to exercise the powers under C.P.C. for various purposes, to serve the ends of justice between the parties, there is no reason as to why the adjudicatory procedure may not encapsulate the requirement of framing the issues by the Controlling Authority so that the parties are facilitated with an opportunity of leading evidence on the predetermined issues, which in turn would facilitate the adjudication between the parties in a more fair and just manner.

8. Coming to the case at hand, Sri Gupta learned counsel for the petitioner, drawing attention of this Court to the objection raised before the Controlling Authority, has pointed out that the opposite party No. 3 before approaching the Controlling Authority had not made any application in the prescribed form whatsoever before the employer so as to reap the benefit under Section 7 of the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972. Moreover, the opposite party No. 3 had retired from service on 30.6.2005 and there was no application for condonation of delay without which a claim would not be entertainable in the year 2010 unless the delay was condoned. Thus, the jurisdictional error attacking the correctness of the judgment/order rendered by the Controlling Authority has been urged on this premise.

9. Insofar as the issues determinable between the parties are concerned, it is evident from the record that several issues