Considerations Of Sympathy, Grace, Compassion & Charity Beyond Scope Of High Courts’ Writ Powers: Supreme Court
The Supreme Court held that if belated options were to be accepted, it would bring in "chaos, confusion and public inconvenience" without there being any end in sight.
The Supreme Court set aside the Telangana High Court’s judgment that allowed an employee’s pension application after the deadline, holding that discretion should not be coloured by sympathy, grace, compassion, or charity when no valid justification for the delay is proffered.
The Court allowed an Appeal against the Telangana High Court's Division Bench’s decision, which had permitted a retired Bank of India employee to submit a pension application after the deadline prescribed in the policy circular under the Bank of India (Employees’) Pension Scheme, 1995.
A Bench of Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice Manmohan remarked, “The Division Bench, in course of its interference with the order dismissing the writ petition, failed to realise that in exercise of writ powers under Article 226 of the Constitution, the high courts of the country do not come to the aid of the tardy, the indolent, and the lethargic. This golden truth has to borne in mind by all courts exercising high prerogative writ jurisdiction. While mandamus will issue to reach injustice, wherever found, it is equally true that exercise of discretion should not unnecessarily be coloured by considerations of sympathy or grace or compassion or charity. These are beyond the scope of the high courts’ writ powers.”
AOR Som Raj Choudhury appeared for the Appellants, while Senior Advocate V. Shanth Kumar Mahale represented the Respondents.
Brief Facts
The Appellant had issued a Circular inviting eligible retired employees to exercise an option to join the a pension scheme. The Respondent, who had travelled to the United States, had returned to India before the deadline, but did not exercise his option to apply for the pension within the stipulated period. He later claimed that he was unaware of the circular and submitted a representation four months after the deadline, seeking to opt for the scheme.
After the Appellant refused to accept the option, a Writ Petition was filed before the High Court. The Single bench rejected the same holding that the period for exercise of option having expired by the time the Respondent exercised his option, the decision not to entertain the option was neither unreasonable nor arbitrary.
Court’s Reasoning
The Supreme Court held that “If belated options are to be accepted, it would bring in its train chaos, confusion and public inconvenience without there being any end in sight and unsettle the very settlement reached by and between the parties which is the foundation of the rights of the subjects.”
Therefore, it stated, “We have no hesitation to hold that the Division Bench was entirely wrong in interfering with the dismissal of the writ petition, as ordered by the Single Judge.”
The Court explained that the Respondent had neither sustained any injury to any legally protected interest nor had he been subjected to a legal wrong. “He did not suffer a legal grievance and had no legal peg for a justiciable claim to hang on. Thus, not having a legally protected right which could have been judicially enforced by seeking a mandamus, the writ petition of the first respondent was plainly not maintainable and, thus, the Single Judge rightly dismissed the same,” it remarked.
Consequently, the Court held, “Since it had not been shown to the High Court that the said circular was not widely published and, therefore, opening up a window of opportunity for submission of options between 1st September and 30th October, 2010 was nothing more than a mere lip service, no case for interference had been set up by the first respondent either...Also, there being no unreasonableness or arbitrariness in the process of decision making adopted by the appellants, the writ petition rightly came to be dismissed and there was absolutely no occasion for the Division Bench to interfere and allow the writ appeal of the first respondent.”
Accordingly, the Supreme Court allowed the Appeal.
Cause Title: Bank of India & Ors. v. Muthyala Saibaba Suryanarayana Murthy & Anr. (Neutral Citation: 2025 INSC 373)
Appearance:
Appellants: AOR Som Raj Choudhury; Advocates Shrutee Aradhana, Siddhant Goel and Prashant Kumar
Respondents: Senior Advocate V. Shanth Kumar Mahale; AOR Abhijit Sengupta; Advocate V. Sridhar Reddy