Geevarghese, T. vs State of Kerala and Another

C.S. Rajan, J.—The Appellant wants to correct his date of birth from 13th July 1943 (29th Midhunam 1118 M.E.) to 19th September 1944 (3rd Kanni 1120 M.E.). The request for correction of the date of birth was rejected by the second Respondent by Ext. P-6 order dated 2nd May 1994. The Appellant filed an appeal against the above order before the first Respondent. The above appeal was also rejected by Ext. P-8 order dated 18th May 1995. Aggrieved by Ext. P-8 order, the Appellant filed O.P. No. 10829 of 1995 before this Court. A learned Single Judge by Ext. P-13 judgment, dated 30th November 1995 quashed Ext. P-8 order and directed the first Respondent to consider the appeal petition submitted by the Appellant afresh after taking into consideration the document produced by the Appellant. Thereafter the second Respondent passed Ext. P-15 order dated 9th February 1996 again rejecting the request of the Appellant to correct his date of birth. The challenge against Ext. P-15 order was not successful before the learned Single Judge. Hence this appeal.

Sri M.V. Bose, learned Counsel for the Appellant strenuously argued that Ext. P-15 order did not consider any of the documents produced by the Appellant as directed in Ext. P-13 judgment. The most important document which the Appellant is relying on is Ext. P-2 certificate of birth issued by Taluk Panchayat Officer, Quilon. The date of registration of the birth as seen in Ext. P-2 is 12th Kanni 1120. The date of birth as entered in the register is 3rd Kanni 1120 corresponding to 19th September 1944. But curiously the name of the Appellant was not entered originally in the register. It is seen that as per the order of the Director of Panchayat dated 23rd June 1992, the name of the Appellant was entered in the register on 23rd July 1992. In this connection it is pertinent to note that the earliest petition filed by the Appellant to condone the delay to apply to the second Respondent for correction of date of birth was 7th August 1992. Therefore it is not safe to rely on Ext. P-2 certificate of birth issued by the Taluk Panchayat Officer in order to conclusively hold that the real date of birth of the Appellant is 3rd Kanni 1120.

The other document which the Appellant strongly relies on is Ext. P-3 baptism certificate and Ext. P-11 family register, both issued by the church. They are also not to be relied on because they were issued only in 1992 and in 1995. The certificates issued by the church cannot be described as reliable documents as against the school records of the Appellant.

The recent trend of judical precedents in the matter of correction of the date of birth of Government servants is against exercising the discretionary jurisdiction of the High Courts/Tribunals to correct the date of birth of employee so as to enable them to have an extended lease of official career. In this connection it is useful to refer to one of the recent decisions of the Supreme Court reported in Burn Standard Co. Ltd. and Others Vs. Dinabandhu Majumdar and Another, . In the above judgment the Supreme Court posed the question to be decided as follows:

The importance of the date of birth of an employee given to his employer and accepted as correct by the latter and entered in the ''Service and Leave Record'' of the former, cannot be underestimated,. That is so for the reason that the employees'' service with the employer has to be necessarily regulated according to such date of birth. Therefore, when a person is taken into service on appointment, he would be required by his employer to declare his correct date of birth and support the same by production of appropriate certificates or documents, if any Even then the persons so appointed fail to produce the certificates or documents in proof of their date of birth, they would be required to affix their thumb impression or signature in authentication of their declared ages or dates of birth. When, on the basis of such declaration made or certificates produced by the employee an entry is made of his date of birth in his ''Service and Leave Record'' to be opened, that will amount to acceptance by the employer of such date of birth, as correct, be it the Government or its instrumentality. When such entry is made in service record of the employee the only way in which the employer, Government or its instrumentality can get over such entry, because of subsequent disclosures as to its incorrectness, is to hold an inquiry into the matter by affording an opportunity to the employee concerned to have his say in the matter. But when once the employer, the Government or the instrumentality concerned accepts the date of birth of an employee as declared by him and supported by certificates or documents produced by him and allows him to enter into its service and continue on such basis, is it open to such employee to claim that the date of birth declared and authenticated by him was incorrect and, therefore, the employer, be it the Government or its instrumentality, should correct his date of birth in his ''Service and Leave Record'' according to what he claims to be true and if the Government or its instrumentality concerned refuse to accept such claim, can the High Court in exercise of its discretionary extraordinary writ jurisdiction entertain a writ application to consider the merit of such claim?

The Supreme Court answered the above question as follows:

Entertainment by High Courts of writ applications made by employees of the Government or its instrumentalities at the fag end of their services and when they are due for retirement from their services in our view, is unwarranted. It would be so for the reason that no employee can claim a right to correction of birth date and entertainment of such writ applications for correction of dates of birth of some employees of Government or its instrumentalities will mar the chances of promotion of his juniors and prove to be an undue encouragement to the other employees to make similar applications at the fag end of their service careers with the sole object of preventing their retirements when due. Extraordinary nature of the jurisdiction vested in the High Courts under Article 226 of the Constitution, in our considered view, is not meant to make employees of Government or its instrumentalities to continue in service beyond the period of their entitlement according to dates of birth accepted by their employers, placing reliance on the so called newly found material.

In view of the judicial restraint and fetters imposed by the Supreme Court, it may not be advisable to exercise our jurisdiction in favour of the correction of date of birth.

Moreover, the Appellant is now 50 years old. He has started his official career long back. Now he is a Junior Superintendent in the Revenue Department. In such cases, in a very recent ruling reported in Union of India and others Vs. Mrs. Saroj Bala, the Supreme Court held as follows:

It is unthinkable that having been born in an educated family and having remained in service for 18 years she discovered that her date of birth would be wrong. Under these circumstances, the Tribunal was wholly unjustified and obviously illegal in allowing the application and directing correction of the date of birth.

The explanation offered by the Appellant for the inordinate delay in finding out his mistake in the date of birth is that his father who was illiterate registered the date of birth in the school records at the time of school admission incorrectly and that the Appellant came to understand the actual date of birth accidentally only in 1991 from his mother. But there is Anr. hurdle for the Appellant if we accept the above explanation. If the date of birth of the Appellant is accepted as 19th September 1944, the age of the Appellant at the time of his admission in Standard I becomes below 4 years. Somewhere in the late 1940''s it could not have been the practice to admit children to the school at such an early stage as it is now the practice. Therefore the case put forward by the Appellant is unbelievable in all respects.

Under these circumstances we do not find any reason to interfere with the judgment of the learned Single Judge who rightly rejected the claim of the Appellant.

The writ appeal is dismissed.