Punjab & Haryana High Court Quashes Withdrawal of Pay Revision for Accounts Cadre in Power Utilities; Reaffirms Equal Pay for Equal Work and Board’s Exclusive Authority
Case Name: Naresh Kumar and Others v. Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited and Others
Date of Judgment: 15 January 2026
Citation: CWP-18478-2015 and connected matters
Bench: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Harpreet Singh Brar
Held: The Punjab and Haryana High Court held that the Board of Directors of a power utility is the competent authority to decide pay revisions of its employees and that the Haryana Bureau of Public Enterprises has no jurisdiction to veto such decisions taken prior to the 2020 amendment of the Articles of Association. The Court further held that denial of revised pay scales to Accounts Officers performing identical duties as their counterparts in another power utility violates the constitutional doctrine of equal pay for equal work.
Summary: The batch of writ petitions arose out of the non-implementation of a decision dated 25.11.2009 taken by the Board of Directors of Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited (DHBVNL), whereby revised pay scales were approved for Accounts Officers and Senior Accounts Officers to bring them at par with Engineering cadres. The decision was based on recommendations of a Coordination Committee constituted after the bifurcation of the erstwhile Haryana State Electricity Board to ensure uniformity across successor power utilities.
Despite approval by the Board of Directors, the revised pay scales were not implemented on the ground that approval of the Haryana Bureau of Public Enterprises (HBPE) was not granted. During pendency of the writ petitions, the Board of Directors of DHBVNL withdrew its earlier decision in 2016 citing financial constraints.
The petitioners contended that the Board of Directors was the supreme executive authority under the Articles of Association and that its decision could not be stalled or nullified by HBPE. They further argued that similarly situated Accounts Officers in Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Limited were granted the benefit pursuant to a judgment of this Court in Pawan Kumar v. UHBVNL, which had attained finality up to the Supreme Court. Denial of parity, it was argued, amounted to hostile discrimination and violated Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution.
The respondents defended the withdrawal on grounds of financial distress, separate corporate identity of the utilities, and reliance on subsequent amendments to the Articles of Association mandating reference of pay revision matters to HBPE.
The Court rejected the respondents’ stand and undertook an extensive analysis of the doctrine of equal pay for equal work, relying on settled Supreme Court precedents including Randhir Singh v. Union of India and State of Punjab v. Jagjit Singh. The Court held that once it is undisputed that the petitioners and their counterparts in another utility possess identical qualifications, perform identical duties, and were recruited through a common selection process, denial of parity in pay scales is constitutionally impermissible.
The Court further held that the competence of the Board of Directors to revise pay scales, and the lack of any veto power with HBPE, stood conclusively settled by earlier judgments. The subsequent 2020 amendment to the Articles of Association was held to operate prospectively and could not be relied upon to justify non-implementation or withdrawal of a valid decision taken in 2009.
Decision: The writ petitions were disposed of. The decision dated 06.07.2016 withdrawing the earlier approval of pay revision was quashed. The matter was remitted to the Board of Directors of DHBVNL to reconsider the petitioners’ claim afresh in light of parity with similarly situated employees in other power utilities and to take a reasoned decision within six weeks.