This Letters Patent Appeal seeks intervention in a Writ Petition regarding delayed payment for pro-bono work. The High Court affirmed the lower court's dismissal, citing laches and lack of documentary evidence supporting the claim.
The appeal was dismissed with no further relief to this Court.
This page shows the compact analysis of this judgement. The full analysis — procedural history, issue-by-issue holdings with ratio and obiter, advocates, and paragraph-level evidence for every claim — is being added to the record in batches and will appear here when this judgement has been through it.
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA Letters Patent Appeal No.1539 of 2019
In
Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.18060 of 2019
======================================================
... ... Appellant/s
Versus
Patna High Court L.P.A No.1539 of 2019(3) dt.19-12-2022 2/5
... ... Respondent/s
====================================================== Appearance : For the Appellant/s : Mr.Akshansh Ankit For the Respondent/s : Ms. Nutan Sahay ====================================================== CORAM: HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE ASHUTOSH KUMAR and HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE NAWNEET KUMAR PANDEY
ORAL ORDER
(Per: HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE ASHUTOSH KUMAR)
3 19-12-2022
Heard Mr. Akshansh Ankit, the learned counsel
for the appellants and Ms. Nutan Sahay, the learned counsel for the State.
The appellants had offered their pro-bono services for seven years but were not paid for the same. Their request was but turned down by the learned Single Judge vide order dated 06.09.2019 passed in C.W.J.C. No. 18060 of 2019.
The perusal of the order, referred to above, indicates that the appellants were engaged in Labour Awareness Programme which was initiated by Labour Resource Department, Government of Bihar.
For the aforesaid work and other associated works for which the appellants had not consented, no
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remuneration was given to them.
The writ petition was dismissed on two grounds,
one being the laches as the appellants had approached the Court after 10 years and the other that the claim of the appellants was earlier adjudicated and rejected by a bench of this Court.
It appears that initially a Public Interest Ligation was filed seeking a general direction to the Government in the Labour Department to make payment of remuneration to the persons who were made to work in various projects but the same was dismissed with the liberty to the individual petitioners to agitate their cause in an appropriate forum.
The appellants, thereafter, preferred another writ petition vide C.W.J.C. No. 17242 of 2015 which stood dismissed for non-compliance of a peremptory order of the Court. The restoration application was also dismissed in the year 2019.
The learned counsel for the appellants has, however, submitted that the appellants are the low men on
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the totem pole who were made to work for good seven years without any remuneration. Every day of work without remuneration kept the cause of action alive and it matters not, if ten years have passed by, when the appellants have not been paid. Their claim was never adjudicated and rejected as the writ petition preferred by them was dismissed for non-compliance of the peremptory order of this Court.
Be that as it may, considering that there is nothing on record for us to conclude that the appellants had actually worked and for what duration, there would be no justification for interfering with the order of the learned Single Judge which primarily has been passed on the ground of laches.
We have perused the writ petition and we find that except for bald statements seeking to claim remuneration for the work that they have done in the Awareness Programme of the Labour Department as also other programmes, there is no other corresponding document to support their contention.
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Having tested the claim of the appellants at all
fronts, we do not find any justification for interfering with
the order of the learned Single Judge.
The appeal is dismissed.
(Ashutosh Kumar, J)
( Nawneet Kumar Pandey, J)
sunilkumar/-
U
1 issue framed by the court
Whether the appellants are entitled to remuneration for their pro-bono services in the Labour Awareness Programme after a decade-long delay.
Naresh Prasad and Others
The State of Bihar
Ashutosh Kumar
Nawneet Kumar Pandey
As recorded by the court registry
Judgements on the same questions, provisions and authorities, from every court
