Gajendragadkar, C.J— An application made by the respondent, Pushkar Datt Sharma, against the appellant Divisional Superintendent, Northern Railway, Allahabad, and D.P.O Northern Railway, Allahabad under Section 15(2) and (3) of the Payment of Wages Act, 1936 (4 of 1936) (hereinafter called “the Act”) has been allowed by the Authority appointed under the Act, and the appellant has been ordered to pay to the respondent Rs 22,829-20P within a month from the date of the order. After the application was made, the respondent moved the Authority to condone the delay made by him in presenting the said application and since the Authority was satisfied that the respondent had sufficient cause for not making the application within the period prescribed by Section 15(2), the delay was condoned and his application was entertained and allowed on the merits.
2. Against this decision, the appellant went in appeal before the Additional District Judge at Allahabad. The main point which was urged before the appellate court was that the Authority was not justified in condoning the delay made by the respondent in moving it under Section 15 of the Act. The appellate court rejected this contention, with the result that the order passed by the Authority was confirmed. The appellant then moved the Allahabad High Court by a revision application and raised the same contention. The High Court took the view that there was no justification for interfering with the decision of the Authority that a case had been made out to its satisfaction for condoning the delay, and so, the revision application filed by the appellant was dismissed. It is this order which is challenged before us by the learned Attorney-General on behalf of the appellant by special leave granted by this Court on the 6th October, 1964.
3. Section 15 of the Act deals with claims arising out of deductions from wages or delay in payment of wages, and it provides, inter alia, that a claim which an employee wants to make under its provisions, shall be presented within six months from the date on which the deduction from the wages was made or from the date on which the payment of the wages was due to be made, as the case may be. The application in question was made on 7th July, 1962, and by his application the respondent claimed from the appellant past wages due to him between December 24, 1947 and 6th July, 1962. The respondent was dismissed on December 23, 1947 and his case before the Authority was that his dismissal had been pronounced by the High Court to be illegal and void on the 9th January, 1962 and that gave rise to his claim for wages over the period from the date of his dismissal until the date of his application. That is how the preliminary question which the Authority had to consider was whether the respondent had made out a case for condoning the delay made by him in making the present application beyond six months prescribed by the first proviso to Section 15(2). The second proviso to the said section authorises the Authority to entertain the application even though it may be made beyond the prescribed period of limitation, provided the Authority is satisfied that the applicant had sufficient cause for not making the application within such period; and as we have already mentioned the Authority was satisfied and delay was condoned by it.
4. It is necessary at this stage to mention a few facts which gave rise to the respondent's claim. The respondent was dismissed on December 23, 1947 and he challenged the validity and the legality of his dismissal by a civil suit. His suit was decreed on March 31, 1951 as a result of which it was declared that his dismissal was illegal. On appeal by the appellant, the said decree was set aside and the respondent's suit was dismissed on August 14, 1952. The respondent then went in second appeal to the Allahabad High Court and he succeeded, with the result that the decree passed by the trial court in his favour was restored on January 9, 1962. Against this decree, the appellant preferred a Special Appeal before a Division Bench of the said High Court. This appeal was ultimately dismissed on September 16, 1964 and that has finally closed the dispute between the parties as to the invalidity of the respondent's dismissal.
5. At the hearing of the present appeal, Mr Mani for the respondent raised a preliminary objection that the appeal as filed was incompetent, because the D.P.O, Northern Railway who was one of the parties against whom the respondent had claimed relief before the Authority, had not joined the making of the present appeal. In our opinion, this contention is not well-founded. Though along with the appellant, D.P.O, Northern Railway had been impleaded in the present proceedings before the Authority, the Authority had passed the order against the appellant and in fact, it was the appellant alone who had moved the Additional District Judge in appeal. Therefore, the contention that the appeal is incompetent for non-joinder of a necessary party, fails.
6. Then, as to the merits of the appeal, it seems to us that it is impossible to accede to the learned Attorney-General's argument that this Court should interfere with the order passed by the Authority under the second proviso to Section 15(2) of the Act. It appears that when special leave was granted to the appellant, it was not known or noticed that the special appeal preferred by the appellant against the decision of the second appeal had already been dismissed by the High Court. Special Leave was granted to the appellant apparently on the assumption that the dispute between the parties in respect of the dismissal of the respondent was still pending in the special appeal before the High Court and it was thought that until the said dispute was finally decided, it would be inappropriate to allow the respondent to withdraw the whole of the amount decreed in his favour by the Authority; otherwise it is difficult to see how the appellant could have successfully moved this Court for special leave in a matter of this kind.
7. Apart from this consideration, however, there can be little doubt that the jurisdiction conferred on the Authority by the second proviso to Section 15(2) of the Act clearly shows that if the Authority is satisfied that there was sufficient cause for the delay, the decision of the Authority in such a discretionary matter could not have been questioned by the appellant before the High Court in its revisional jurisdiction, and much less before this Court.
8. It may be that a claim for payment of wages has to be made within six months from the date when the wages fell due and in that sense, an application under Section 15(2) must be made within six months of the accrual of the cause of action from month to month; but in the present case, when the appellate court dismissed the respondent's suit on August 14, 1952 it was not open to the respondent to apply under Section 15(2), because the appellate Court had held that his dismissal was justified and valid. It was only when the second appeal was allowed on January 9, 1962 that the respondent had a cause of action. It is very unfortunate that the second appeal was pending in the High Court for nearly ten years; but that cannot prejudicially affect the respondent's case when he moved the Authority under Section 15(2) of the Act. The Attorney-General fairly told us that judicial decisions disclosed a difference of opinion on the question as to whether in such a case, it would have been competent to the respondent to move the Authority under Section 15(2) when his claim had been dismissed by the appellate court. However that may be, it seems to us that in the circumstances of this case, the Attorney-General cannot successfully contend that the High Court was in error in refusing to interfere with the discretionary order passed by the Authority and confirmed by the Additional District Judge. Besides, it is not easy to understand why the appellant should have come to this Court when it is now established by the final decision of the Allahabad High Court that the dismissal of the respondent was illegal. In view of that finding, it is plainly the duty of the appellant to pay the respondent all wages due to him.
9. The result is, the appeal fails and is dismissed with costs.