Workman cannot challenge Med Board assessment on age: SC

The Supreme Court has held that in absence of a genuine date of birth certificate, a workman after his retirement cannot challenge the correctness of his age assessed at the time of joining by the medical board.

The verdict was delivered by a Bench comprising Justice AR Lakshmanan and Justice Tarun Chatterjee while adjudicating the dispute of a workman from Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO) who after joining the company in 1940 had accepted the age assessed by the Medical officer till 1972.

However, in 1972, he procurred a certificate from a school in Dhaka, Bangladesh to claim that his date of birth was not November 1, 1923 as assessed by the medical board but August 11, 1929.

Later, when the certificate was found to be not genuine, the workman produced another cerficate purportedly issued by the Headmaster of the same school to take the benefit.

Once again his case was referred to the medical board, which assessed the age to be 58 years on September 13, 1984, concluding that his date of birth was 1926 which was accepted by him without any objection.

However, after a year's extention in the company, the worker once again disputed the age assesssed by the Medical Board and succeeded in getting relief from the Labour Court which was set aside by the Jharkhand High Court.

Upholding the verdict of the High Court, the apex court said "the workman in the present case is stopped from challenging the correctness of the opinion of the medical board after his retirement".

Article Source: http://www.share.onlypunjab.com

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