Review petition cannot be used to rehear an erroneous decision or act as an appeal in disguise.

The Applicant, Mohan Paswan, filed a Review Application (R.A.) seeking the review of the Tribunal's order dated 19.02.2026, which had dismissed his Original Application (O.A. 350/01419/2021)

In the original O.A., the Applicant had sought the "stepping up" of his pay by relying on a 1995 decision from the Mumbai Bench of the Tribunal

The Tribunal dismissed the O.A. on the grounds that the Applicant failed to establish the finality or implementation of the Mumbai Bench precedent and because the case lacked merit

The Applicant moved the current petition asserting that errors were apparent on the face of the record and that new matters existed

1. Whether there exists a mistake or error apparent on the face of the record or the discovery of new and important evidence sufficient to warrant a review under Order 47 Rule 1 of the CPC

2. Whether a review petition can be used to re-argue the merits of a case or act as an "appeal in disguise"

The Tribunal applied Section 22(3)(f) of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985, noting its power to review is analogous to Section 114 read with Order 47 Rule 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure (CPC)

It relied on Gopal Singh v. State Cadre Forest Officers' Assn. (2007) regarding the recognized grounds for review

Aribam Tuleshwar Sharma v. Aribam Pishak Sharma (1979), which held that review power cannot be exercised on the ground that a decision is erroneous on merits, as that is the province of an appeal

Parsion Devi v. Sumitri Devi (1997), establishing that a review is not a "rehearing" or an "appeal in disguise"

State of West Bengal v. Kamal Sengupta (2008), which clarifies that an error must be self-evident and not requiring a long process of reasoning to be considered "apparent on the face of the record"

The Tribunal examined the grounds raised by the Petitioner and concluded that all arguments regarding the stepping up of pay and the Mumbai Bench precedent had already been considered during the original adjudication of the O.A. on 19.02.2026

Applying the principles from Kamal Sengupta, the Tribunal reasoned that a review cannot be granted based on a subsequent decision or a desire to re-examine an "erroneous" decision

The Tribunal found that the Applicant failed to produce any "new and important matter" that was not within his knowledge despite due diligence at the time of the original order

It emphasized that the power of review is restricted to correcting patent errors and cannot be used to correct a judgment simply because the petitioner disagrees with the conclusion on merits

Consequently, the Review Petition was dismissed

The Tribunal affirmed that the application was essentially a request for a rehearing, which is impermissible under the limited jurisdiction of Order 47 Rule 1 of the CPC