Fourteen years after the Tamil Nadu government cancelled freedom fighter’s pension to a person on the ground that he was a “minor” on the date when he took part in the struggle, the Madras High Court has restored it to him.
K.R. Arumugam submitted an application for freedom fighter’s pension in April 1979. After 15 years, the government sanctioned the pension. By a notice of May 1999, the government called upon him to show cause why the relief should not be cancelled. He submitted his explanation. Ultimately, by an order dated July 13, 2000, the pension was cancelled.
Mr.Arumugam filed a writ petition in 2002 challenging the cancellation order. In February 2014, a single Judge found that the government had not produced any document to show the actual date of his birth and set aside the cancellation order.
Aggrieved, the government filed the present appeal.
A Division Bench comprising Justices Satish K. Agnihotri and K.K. Sasidharan said the order granting freedom fighter’s pension was recalled on the ground that he was only a minor on the date when he participated in the freedom movement. The government had relied on ration card and voters’ list to prove that he had shown incorrect particulars to claim pension.
The Bench observed that the government did not produce any document to show that Mr. Arumugam was a minor on the date mentioned. The single Judge had considered this issue extensively and arrived at the correct finding.
Dismissing the government’s appeal against a single Judge’s order, the Bench said it did not find any reason to take a different view in the matter.
