1 2026:HHC:5869 IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH SHIMLA CWP No. 2498 of 2026 Date of Decision : 05.03.2026 ________________________________________________________ Archit Butail …..Petitioner Versus Union of India & others ...Respondents. ________________________________________________________ Coram: The Hon’ble Mr. Justice G.S. Sandhawalia, Chief Justice. The Hon’ble Mr. Justice Bipin C. Negi, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 ____________________________________________________ For the Petitioner: Mr. Abhinav Mohan Goel, Advocate. For the Respondents: Mr. Balram Sharma, Deputy Solicitor General of India with Mr. Rajeev Sharma, Advocate, for respondents No. 1 & 2. Mr. Pranay Pratap Singh, Additional Advocate General, for respondents No. 3 & 4. _______________________________________________________ G.S. Sandhawalia , Chief Justice (Oral) Notice. Mr. Balram Sharma, Learned Deputy Solicitor General of India, accepts notice for respondents No. 1 & 2-Union of India and Mr. Pranay 1 Whether the reporters of Local Papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2 Pratap Singh, learned Additional Advocate General, accepts the same on behalf of the respondents-State. 2. Learned Counsel for the parties are agreed that the issue in question is covered by the decision of this Court in LPA No.169 of 2025, titled Union of India and another versus Atul Sharma and others, along with connected matters, decided on 16.07.2025. The relevant portion of the said judgment reads as under: “10. Learned Single Judge found that the appellant Union of India could not in the first set of cases, deny the fact that the applications had been forwarded during currency of the Scheme and therefore, consideration had not been done. In such circumstances, he came to the conclusion that at least the consideration had to be made as per the terms of the policy dated 23.04.2018 (Annexure P-1). Thus, we cannot find any fault as such with the reasoning of the learned Single Judge to this extent. 11. Counsel for Union of India also admits that since each and every individual case will have to be considered within the parameters of the said policy, it would be appropriate that a decision making is done by the Empowered Committee by fixing a time frame as such. We are also of the considered opinion that the findings as such that the consideration was to 3 be done by the Empowered Committee, thus cannot be faulted in any manner, once it is the case of the State also that they had forwarded their cases to the Empowered Committee. If that is so, then the decision making as such had to be done as per the parameters of the notification and as noticed above, has now been done in one case though, the rejection is here. 12. In such circumstances, we are of the considered opinion that present LPAs are liable to be disposed of in the above terms along with writ petitions that each and every individual case has to be considered afresh by the Empowered Committee. Let the said exercise be done within a period of four months from today. Needless to say that it will be open to the applicants, as such, to seek their remedy in accordance with law in case there is rejection of their case. 13. All pending applications stand disposed of accordingly.” 3. We are now further informed that a bunch of Special Leave Petition(s) were also dismissed on 30.01.2026, the lead case of which is Union of India & another Vs. Atul Sharma and others. 4. In view of the above, the present petition is disposed of in terms of the aforesaid judgment. 4 5. Pending miscellaneous application(s), if any, shall also stand disposed of. (G.S. Sandhawalia) Chief Justice. March 05, 2026 (Bipin C. Negi) (hemlata) Judge.