- (1.) Respondent 1 herein was the Principal of an institution run by the appellant herein. He is said to have committed certain acts of misconduct, which having come to the notice of the appellant, a disciplinary proceeding was initiated against him wherein he was found guilty. Pursuant thereto and in furtherance thereof, he was dismissed from service. Aggrieved there against, an appeal was preferred by the said respondent before the State Government which remained pending for a considerable period of time. In the meanwhile, the respondent filed a writ petition before the High Court. Although the said appeal was disposed of by the State Government on or about 21.11.1984, the same was not brought to the notice of the High Court and by reason of an order dated 23.11.1984 the State Government was directed to dispose of the appeal preferred by the respondent. On a mistaken belief that a fresh order was required to be passed by it, the appeal of the respondent was taken up for hearing again by the State Government which was partly allowed, in terms whereof the respondent was not granted the arrears of salary while the order of dismissal was set aside. Both the parties herein preferred respective writ petitions being aggrieved by and dissatisfied therewith. A Single Judge of the High Court while allowing the writ petition preferred by the appellant, dismissed the one preferred by the respondent. A special leave petition was filed by the respondent herein against the said order, whereupon this Court disposed of the matter ex parte by an order dated 25.1.1988, observing: "Special leave granted. Appeal is heard. We are informed that the appellant has made an application before the State Government for setting aside the ex parte order dated 21.11.1984. The State Government shall dispose of that application, if such an application is pending before it. We express no opinion on the merits of the case. Appeal disposed of accordingly."
(2.) It is not in dispute that in fact no appeal was pending before the State Government at the relevant point of time; but purported to be on the strength of the aforesaid order of this Court the respondent filed a fresh appeal before the Chief Minister whereupon a direction was made that the appeal be heard by the appropriate authority. The said appeal was allowed. Aggrieved thereby, the appellant filed a writ petition before the High Court. The said writ petition was allowed by a learned Single Judge, inter alia, holding that this Court in its order dated 25.1.1988 did not give any fresh opportunity to the respondent to file a separate appeal. The respondent preferred a letters patent appeal against the said judgment. The Division Bench of the High Court by reason of the impugned Judgement directed the matter to be heard afresh upon remission thereof, stating: "The writ court had propounded a strange logic, that as the Supreme Court order passed in SLP No. 10062 of 1986 dated 25.1.1988 perceived Appellate Authority's appeal could not be reheard by the Government. Less said about it the better, because any touching of contours of Supreme Court order may compound the error. Suffice it to say that an ex parte order is an order passed in the absence of the other party even though on merits. Viewed thus, it cannot be gainsaid that the Apex Court had directed the Appellate Authority to consider the appellant's application for setting aside 'ex parte order dated 21.11.1984' if it was pending before it. As such the authority had no choice but to accord consideration to any such pending application, though it was open for it to accept it or reject it. All this notwithstanding, it is generally hazardous and unsafe and transgressed boundaries of propriety to interpret terms of superior court order and to lend meaning to it. If such order is capable of two views and is liable to clarification, it is for the superior court to clarify it and to bring out its real impact. Considering all this, we feel convinced, that the writ court ought not to have taken upon itself to interpret the Supreme Court order to allow writ petition of Respondent 2. Mr Maheshwari's last-minute submission that the appellant deserved no indulgence because of his involvement in scandalous activities and because of grave misconduct, which was unbecoming of a Principal of an educational institution and his reliance on the Supreme Court judgment in this regard was wide off the mark because we are not called upon in this appeal to examine the merit of the appellant's dismissal from service which had remained untouched and unconsidered throughout. This submission may have held good if the validity of such dismissal was under scrutiny. But in the present case as noticed above, the controversy had unfortunately dragged on side issues."
(3.) Consequent upon the said findings, the appeal was allowed in part by directing: "Writ court order dated 7.4.1995 passed in MP No. 450 of 1994 is set aside. The matter is remanded to the writ court for reconsideration of MP No. 450 of 1994 on merit of issues involved related to validity of the appellant's dismissal from service. Registrar to post the matter before appropriate Bench for disposal as Case No. 1 in the week commencing 24.8.1998.";