1. ' MALIK ZAWWAR HUSSAIN (MEMBER).-The appellant has filed this appeal on 15th September, 1980 and impleaded Deputy Commissioner/ Project Director, PWP, Sahiwal, Commissioner, Multan Div.
2. Multan and Secy : LG & RD Deptt , Government of the Punjab, as respondents. By virtue of this appeal he has prayed that the order dated 21st December, 1976, passed by Deputy Commissioner/Project Director, whereby he was retired compulsorily from service and the order dated 26th July, 1977 of the Commissioner be set aside and he be re-instated in service with all back benefits.
3. ' Brief facts of the case are that the appellant was charge sheeted for having made fardged entries in respect of earth work at link road 15/11-L to 13/11-L in measurement book No, 239 at pages 79, 81 and on pages 45-50 of M, B. No, 240 and subsequently for having allegedly tampared with the above said entries to show the reduced quantity of earth work. He was also charge sheeted for ante-dating the measurements recorded at pages 45-50 of M. B. No, 240. Assistant Commissioner, Pakpattan, was appointed as Enquiry Officer who submitted his report to the competent authority, and the Deputy Commissioner after hearing the appellant compulsorily retired him from service.
4. He filed an appeal before the Commissioner which was also rejected vide order dated 26th July, 1977. Hence this appeal.
5. ' We have heard the learned counsel for the appellant, and learned D.A. On behalf of the respondents and have also perused the record with their assistance. It has been argued on behalf of the appellant that the appellant has only committed one mistake and that was due to inadvertence and his service record otherwise is quite clean. He has submitted that in view of the law laid down in PLD 1977 Supreme Court page 24 this being the first lapse of the appellant, the punishment awarded is too severe and is not in consonance with the gravity of the charges against him. On the other hand the learned D.A has submitted that according to the E & D Rules so applicable to the appellant only one appeal is provided against the original order and that too was rejected by the Commissioner on 26th July, 1977 and the present appeal has been filed on 15th September, 1979, after a period of more than 2 years and 9 months as against the prescribed period of 30 days. He has submitted that the appellant persistently went on filing appeals to higher authorities and according to the appellant these were so filed on wrong legal advice. He has submitted that this is not a good ground for the condonation of delay, more particularly when no such affidavit has been filed of the learned advocate who had given the wrong advice. He has argued that the appeal is liable to be dismissed only on this score. He has also submitted that the appellant also had filed a representation to the Martial Law Authorities and the Review Board so constituted by the M. L. Authorities also rejected his appeal. He has argued that since the appeal/representation had been rejected by the Review Board constituted under the directions of M. L. Authorities the present appeal I s also hit by Article 15(2) of the PCO. On merits the learned D. A.
6. Has submitted that it may be the first lapse on the part of the appellant but the fact remains that he instead of scoring out the entries he removed them by Ink-remover and when the enquiry was initiated against him maneuvered for making good the loss to the Government through the contractor.
7. We have given our anxious thought to the arguments of the parties and have also perused the record including the relevant Measurement Books. Admittedly, the present appeal has been filed on 15th September, 1980 while his departmental appeal was rejected on 26th July, 1977. Since his representation so filed to the Sec was not disposed of within a statutory period of 90 days so under section 4 of the Punjab Service Tribunal Act and in view of the law laid down by the Supreme Court in case reported as 1980 SCMR page 260 the appellant was bound to file an appeal before this Tribunal within 30 days after the expiry of the prescribed period of 90 days. Hence we hold that the present appeal is time barred. With regard to the argument of the learned counsel for the] respondent that the appeal is hit by Article 15(2) of the PCO we have perused the letter No, 501 (LG)
8. 1 (68)/80, dated 13th October, 1980 whereby with reference to his representation dated 17th June, 1980 the appellant was informed that his appeal was considered by the Commissioner Multan Division and subsequently by the Review Board constituted under the directions of M, L. Authorities and rejected. In view of this he was informed that his representation dated 17th June, 1980 could not be considered and had been filed. The perusal of this letter clearly shows that his representation was rejected by the Review Board constituted under the directions of M. L. Authorities. Article 15(2) of the PCO is reproduced below for the sake of convenience : "15(2). All orders made, proceedings taken and acts done by any authority, or by any person, which were made, taken or done, or purported to have been made, taken or done, on or after the fifth day of July, 1977, in exercise of the powers derived from any President's Orders, Orders of the Chief Martial Law Administrator, Martial Law Regulations, Martial Law Orders, enactments, notifications, rules, orders or bye-laws, or in execution of any Orders made or sentences passed by any authority in the exercise or purported exercise of powers as aforesaid shall, notwithstanding any judgment of any Court, be deemed to be and always to have been validly made, taken or done and shall not be called in question in any court on any ground whatsoever, provided, that nothing in this clause shall apply to .Transactions past and closed.
9. In view of the above provision in the constitution we hold that this appeal is not maintainable with regard to the facts of the case. We have examined the Measurement Books and the enquiry file. It is quite obvious that the appellant has removed the entries in the measurement books by, an Ink- remover without realizing that the measurement is always a basic and very important record of the works so done by the Contractors for making payments to them. Any tampering in such an important record is a heinous allegation and cannot be taken lightly. The Department has already taken a very lenient view by imposing the penalty of compulsory retirement instead of any other major punishment, so it does not call for any interference by us.
10. ' In view of the above discussion we do not see any force in the present appeal which is accordingly dismissed with no orders as to costs.