A belated representation and its rejection cannot revive a stale, time-barred service claim.

The applicant was provisionally selected through DSSSB for appointment as a Driver in 2008. Although the DTC Medical Board initially declared him unfit due to defective vision, he was subsequently declared fit by the Guru Nanak Eye Centre and appointed as a Driver with effect from 20 October 2009.

Following a DTC Board decision to re-examine similarly situated drivers, the applicant was again medically examined in 2013 and declared unfit due to defective vision.

After disciplinary proceedings, he was dismissed from service on 19 August 2016.

Pursuant to directions of the Supreme Court in Surender Singh v. Delhi Transport Corporation, a further Medical Board examined the applicant in 2017 and opined that he suffered from anisometropic amblyopia and that the defective vision existed prior to his joining service.

After issuance of a show-cause notice and consideration of his reply, the respondents removed him from service by order dated 17 January 2018. That removal order was never challenged before the Tribunal.

The applicant later filed O.A. No. 426/2025, which was disposed of with liberty to submit a representation/appeal and with a direction to the respondents to pass a reasoned order, without adjudicating the merits of the original claim.

The respondents rejected the applicant’s appeal by speaking order dated 30 April 2025.

In the present O.A., the applicant sought quashing of that order, consideration for light duties under Section 20 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, and consequential back wages and benefits.

Whether the applicant could challenge the rejection of his belated representation/appeal when the substantive removal order dated 17 January 2018 had never been challenged?

Whether the order dated 30 April 2025 furnished a fresh cause of action or revived the applicant’s stale and time-barred claim?

Whether the applicant was entitled to consideration for light duties under Section 20 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, on the basis of his disability certificate dated 13 November 2014?

The application was filed under Section 19 of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985.

The applicant relied on Section 20 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, which protects an employee from discrimination in employment on account of disability and requires appropriate employment-related protection where disability is acquired during service.

The Tribunal applied the principle laid down in Union of India v. M.K. Sarkar, relying on C. Jacob v. Director of Geology and Mining, that consideration and rejection of a belated representation do not create a fresh cause of action, extend limitation, or revive a stale or dead claim.

The Tribunal also relied on the principle that limitation and delay must be examined with reference to the original cause of action rather than the date of a subsequent administrative decision passed pursuant to a judicial direction to consider a representation.

The Tribunal held that the applicant’s substantive grievance arose from the removal order dated 17 January 2018, which had never been challenged, either earlier or in the present proceedings.

The order dated 30 April 2025 was passed only pursuant to the Tribunal’s earlier direction in O.A. No. 426/2025, where the merits had expressly not been examined; therefore, it could not revive the extinguished cause of action or circumvent limitation.

On merits, the applicant had been given an opportunity during the proceedings preceding the 2018 removal order to produce all relevant medical material. He did not rely at that stage on the AIIMS disability certificate dated 13 November 2014.

Further, the Medical Board constituted pursuant to the Supreme Court’s directions found that his defective vision existed before he entered DTC service.

The Tribunal therefore declined to treat the later-referred disability certificate as sufficient to displace the findings of the duly constituted Medical Board or to establish that the disability was acquired during service.

Consequently, Section 20 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act could not assist the applicant on the facts found by the respondents and the medical authorities.

It found no basis to quash the speaking order, direct his retention or reappointment in light duties, or grant back wages and consequential benefits.

Although the Tribunal observed that the application constituted a misuse of the legal process and would ordinarily merit costs, it dismissed the matter with costs made easy, considering that the applicant was stated to be unemployed.