Service-book date-of-birth entries cannot be altered or disregarded absent prescribed enquiry and due process.

The petitioners were Muster Roll Workers under the Kaliabor Rural Road Division, PWD, engaged on 13 August 1991 and 1 January 1992 respectively. Their services were regularized with effect from 20 July 2005. Their service books recorded their dates of birth as 28 February 1972 and 31 October 1970 respectively, based on the documents furnished by them, including school certificates.

The PWD subsequently detected discrepancies in the names and dates of birth of certain regularized Muster Roll Workers and initiated a departmental correction process by letter dated 28 May 2008. The petitioners’ particulars were included in that process.

A PWD (Audit) list later reflected their dates of superannuation as 28 February 2017 and 31 October 2016, although these dates did not correspond with the dates of birth recorded in their service books. The petitioners were nevertheless permitted to continue working, but their salaries were withheld.

An enquiry conducted through the Deputy Commissioner, Nagaon, included ossification tests and verification of the petitioners’ service books. The Additional Deputy Commissioner’s report dated 1 December 2018 confirmed the dates of birth recorded in the service books. The Executive Engineer also certified that the relevant entries related to the petitioners.

The Finance Department declined to consider the correction proposal, stating that it had been received only on 8 February 2019, after the dates of superannuation relied upon by the Department, and referring to the limitation contemplated under S.R. 8(c) of the Fundamental Rules and Subsidiary Rules.

During the proceedings, petitioner No. 2 died and his legal heirs were substituted.

Whether the petitioners’ dates of birth, as recorded in their service books and supported by subsequent official verification, were liable to be accepted and corrected in the relevant departmental records?

Whether the limitation or procedural requirement under S.R. 8(c) barred consideration of the correction proposal because it reached the Finance Department after the dates of superannuation relied upon by it?

Whether the respondents could withhold salary and other service benefits for the period during which the petitioners were permitted to continue in service and actually discharged their duties?

The Court applied S.R. 8(c) of the Fundamental Rules and Subsidiary Rules concerning alteration or correction of the date of birth recorded in service records.

Relying on Mohan Chandra Das v. The Director, State Transport, Assam & Anr., ALR 1969 Assam and Nagaland 259, the Court held that the date of birth entered in the service book is prima facie binding unless altered through the prescribed procedure, after appropriate enquiry and compliance with natural justice.

The Court also referred to Hari Singh v. State of Bihar, (2000) 10 SCC 284, which establishes that an employee cannot be prematurely retired by relying upon a different date of birth without notice and proper procedural safeguards.

The Court further applied the principle that salary cannot be denied for services actually rendered where the employee was permitted by the employer to continue working.

The Court found that the dates of birth claimed by the petitioners were not belated claims initiated at the end of their service; they were already recorded in the service books and had been the subject of a departmental correction process commencing in 2008.

The subsequent enquiry by the district administration independently confirmed the same dates of birth, and no contrary finding or material was produced to establish that the service-book entries were incorrect.

Accordingly, the Finance Department could not treat 8 February 2019—the date on which it received the proposal—as the commencement of the correction process, since the process had already been initiated by the Department years earlier.

The Court also held that the petitioners’ continued service was undisputed and that the pendency of the correction proceedings could not justify withholding payment for work actually performed.

The alleged damage to office records in the 2017 flood did not affect the conclusion because the service books, school certificates, and subsequent verification supported the petitioners’ dates of birth.

The Court set aside the Finance Department’s endorsement dated 31 May 2019 and the consequential communication dated 20 June 2019 declining to consider the correction proposal.

The respondents were directed to correct petitioner No. 1’s date of birth to 28 February 1972 and late petitioner No. 2’s date of birth to 31 October 1970 in the service books, PWD (Audit) records, and other relevant departmental records.

They were further directed to determine the lawful dates of superannuation on the basis of the corrected dates of birth and applicable service rules.

The respondents were ordered to calculate and release the salary and other admissible service benefits due for the period during which the petitioners actually worked, with amounts payable to the legal heirs of late petitioner No. 2, within three months from receipt of the certified order.