A review petition has a limited purpose and cannot be allowed to be 'an appeal in disguise'. Statements of fact recorded in the judgment of the court are conclusive and cannot be contradicted by affidavit or other evidence.

( 1 ) HEARD. THIS petition is filed under Article 227 of the Constitution of India against the order dated 24-8-1998 passed by the Tribunal in O. A. No. 777/1998. The respondents had filed this original Application, which came up for hearing on 24-8-1998. On behalf of the State Shri p. D. Agarwal, Panel Lawyer had appeared and reply was not filed by him. The Tribunal has specifically noted that reply has not been filed. There is no use to give more time to the respondents to file reply, as the facts of this case are not in dispute. The Tribunal, therefore, in view of this statement proceeded to decide the matter and held that before initiating enquiry after the retirement of the applicant, prior sanction of the Governor had not been taken. The order initiating departmental proceedings against respondent S. S. Bhadoriya was quashed. The Tribunal, however, in the impugned order gave liberty to the State to initiate such enquiry afresh after removing the infirmities.

( 2 ) THEREAFTER, the State filed M. A. No. 251/1998, i. e. , review petition, on 3-10-1998. This review petition was barred by time. No application for condonation of delay was filed. The Tribunal issued notice and thereupon reply was filed. In the order passed on 4-5-2000 in the review petition, the Tribunal has noted that the review application has apparently been filed after expiry of the presecribed period so it is barred by limitation because the impugned order has been passed on 24-8-1998 in O. A. No. 777/1998 while the review petition has been filed on 3-10-1998 seeking the review of the said order. No application for condonation of delay has been filed. The cause of delay stated in the petition and in the affidavit is that the Panel Lawyer did not inform the result of the O. A. in time and the facts came to their knowledge only on 23-9-1998. Shri J. D. Suryawanshi, learned Government advocate in usual fairness informed that the earlier Panel Lawyer, who appeared on 24-8-1998 and the counsel, who appeared on 4-5-2000, is the same.

( 3 ) IN the circumstances, in our opinion, there is no illegality committed by the Tribunal. Even otherwise the Tribunal has considered and has found that,no charge-sheet was served on 29-7-1997, as stated in the review petition and a blank envelope was handed over to the employee. The Tribunal has further noted that on perusal of the papers as submitted by the applicant alongwith this review petition, it is apparent that a sealed cover including charge-sheet was served on the non-applicant just before his retirement. But, the receipt does not disclose that what matter were kept in the envelope and served on the applicant. It is surprising that why the applicants have filed this review petiton when they have a right to initiate enquiry after obtaining proper sanction from the Governor and they are not exercising such discretion.

( 4 ) THE Tribunal has further noted that the applicants State had a right to file reply in O. A. but they did not file so and have filed this review petition to fill the lacuna and wants to reopen the matter by this review petition. The petitioners cannot be permitted to do so under these circumstances.

( 5 ) IT is well settled principle that statements of fact as to what transpired at the hearing, recorded in the judgment of the Court, are conclusive of the facts so stated and no one can contradict such statements by affidavit or other evidence. If a party thinks that the happenings in Court have been wrongly recorded in a judgment, it is incumbent upon the party, while the matter is still fresh in the minds of the Judges, to call the attention of the very judges who have made the record to the fact that the statement made with regard to his conduct was a statement that had been made in error. That is the only way to have the record corrected. If no such step is taken, the matter must, necessarily end there, (See, State of maharashtra v. Ramadas Shrlnivas Nayak and another ).

( 6 ) THE Hon'