Recovery of excess salary from Group C employees is impermissible if paid without employee misrepresentation.

The applicant, a Group-C Sorting Assistant appointed in 1996, was granted his 2nd financial upgradation under the MACP scheme in 2016.

In August 2021, the respondents unilaterally reduced his basic pay from Rs. 56,900/- to Rs. 55,200/- and began recovering "excess" payments totaling Rs. 1,42,947/- following an internal audit that flagged a fixation error under the CCS Revised Pay Rules, 2016.

The applicant challenged the reduction and recovery, alleging a violation of natural justice and citing protections for Group-C employees.

His departmental appeal was rejected on June 27, 2022.

1. Whether the downward revision/refixation of the applicant’s pay by the department was legally sustainable despite the lack of prior notice.

2. Whether the respondents are permitted to recover excess payments made to a Group-C employee due to an administrative error where no misrepresentation was made by the employee.

The court applied Rule 5 of the CCS Revised Pay Rules, 2016, regarding the correct methodology for pay fixation upon implementation of the 7th CPC.

The court relied on the principles established in State of Punjab and Ors v. Rafiq Masih (Whitewasher) (2015) and Thomas Daniel v. State of Kerala (2022), as further consolidated in Jogeswar Sahoo & Ors v. The Dist. Judge Cuttack and others (2025), which prohibits recovery from Group-C/Class III employees when the payment was made in error by the employer without employee fault.

The Tribunal found that while the applicant argued the pay reduction violated natural justice, he failed to provide any rule or substantive evidence to disprove the audit’s findings that his pay had been incorrectly fixed under the 2016 Rules.

Since the end result of refixation was legally compliant with the pay rules, the lack of notice did not warrant quashing the refixation itself.

Regarding the recovery of the Rs. 1,42,947/-, the Tribunal noted the applicant is a Group-C employee and had no role or contribution in the original wrong fixation.

Applying the "hardship" yardsticks from Jogeswar Sahoo, specifically the prohibition of recovery from Group-C/Group-D (Class III/IV) services, the Tribunal determined that the recovery was iniquitous and legally impermissible.

The Tribunal partly allowed the O.A., quashed the recovery of past excess payments, and directed the respondents to refund any amounts already deducted from the applicant’s salary within 60 days.