The Central Board of Trustees has the authority to challenge Tribunal orders regarding recovery of dues, asserting its status as a body corporate under the Employees’ Provident Fund Act.

JUDGMENT

(Judgment of the Court was delivered by T.S.SIVAGNANAM, J.)

1. These intra Court appeals have been filed by the Central Board of Trustees, Employees’ Provident Fund Organization through Regional Provident Fund Commissioner, Kolkata. The contesting respondent in all the appeals are the employers and the other respondent is the Employees’ Provident Fund Appellate Tribunal, New Delhi represented by its Registrar (Tribunal).

2. The appellant had filed the writ petitions challenging the orders passed by the Tribunal in appeals filed by the employers. The Learned Tribunal had allowed the appeals filed by the employer to a limited extent and reduced the damages payable by the employer by a certain percentage. The writ petitions were dismissed at the admission stage, not on merits but on the ground of maintainability as the Central Board of Trustees, Employee’s Provident Fund organization cannot be treated to be aggrieved over the orders passed by the Learned Tribunal. This is a common finding in all the orders which are impugned in this bunch of appeals. In certain cases the learned Writ Court had not only followed the order impugned in MAT No. 1141 of 2017 etc. and while holding the writ petition to be not maintainable at the instance of the Central Board of Trustees also rejected the prayers sought for on the ground that the employer having paid the liability in terms of the order passed by the learned Tribunal and the authorities having accepted the said payment are precluded/estopped from challenging the order of the learned Tribunal. Thus, broadly on the above mentioned two grounds the writ petitions were dismissed. As noted, the writ petitions have all been dismissed at the admission stage as such there was no occasion for the employers to file their affidavit-in- opposition. That apart, the question of maintainability appears to have been suomoto raised by the learned Writ Court at the first instance and thereafter the appellant and the employers have been heard on such issue and the decision has been taken. Therefore, the present appeals lie in a very narrow compass as the issue we are to decide is whether the writ petitions as filed by the appellants in terms of the description mentioned in the cause title was maintainable and whether the department was estopped from challenging the order of the learned Tribunal on the ground that the authorities of the department have recovered/ accepted the payment made by the employers in terms of the order passed by the learned Tribunal.

3. Before we examine the contentions placed before us, we first note as to the broad reasons assigned by learned Single Bench to hold that the writ petitions at the instance of the appellant (as described) is not maintainable. The learned Single Bench firstly faults the description of the writ petitioners as Central Board or Central Board of Trustees Employees’ Provident Fund Organization, the Court held that there is nothing of the sort of Employees’ Provident Fund Organization in the whole scheme of the Act, and this must be the creation of the Provident Fund authorities describing themselves an organization and therefore, the writ petition filed by such non-existing organization or in the name of a fictitious body should fail. Secondly, the Learned Writ Court holds that the writ petitions arise out of the orders passed by the learned Tribunal in appeals filed by the employers and the Central Board of Trustees was not a party to appeal petitions and treating the appellant as a third party, the writ petition at the instance of the appellant