Arijit Pasayat, J. - (1.) The appellant (hereinafter referred to as the employer) calls in question legality of the judgment rendered by a Division Bench of the Allahabad High Court holding that dismissal of respondent No.1 (hereinafter referred to as employee) from service pursuant to the disciplinary proceedings was invalid.
(2.) Respondent No.1-employee filed a writ application questioning legality of the departmental proceedings initiated against him culminating in the order dated 12-7-1993 passed by the Managing Director of the employer - Corporation. The Managing Director was in agreement with the findings of the Enquiry Officer holding that very serious charges of misconduct were proved and, therefore, the respondent No.1-employee was liable for major and deterrent punishment of dismissal. The appeal filed by respondent No.1. employee was dismissed by order dated 31-12-1993 by the Chairman of the Corporation. There were other prayers in the writ petition i.e. (i) to command the respondent in the writ petition to continue his functioning and to pay his regular monthly salary and allowance including arrears of salary from 1-7-1992; (ii) to direct the respondent in the writ petition in the interest of justice to consider the writ petitioners case for voluntary retirement as he had become about 56 years old subject to the decision in the writ petition. The second prayer was made as the writ petitioner believed that the Corporation was in the process of winding up and had even closed two of its mills at Jhansi and Sandeela and all the employees working in its head office had been given option to retire under a voluntary retirement scheme. The disciplinary proceedings were initiated on the basis of a complaint made to the Managing Director. On receipt of the complaint the respondent No.1-employee was asked to furnish his comments about the allegations. Respondent No.1-employee submitted his comments on 27-5-1992 on receipt of the confidential letter dated 2-5-1992 from the Managing Director. Thereafter, on 30-6-1992 an order of suspension was passed by the Managing Director. Six charges were framed against the respondent No.1-employee, all of which related to alleged misconduct and financial irregularities involving several crores of rupees. The Enquiry Officer held that all the six charges except charge No.5 were proved. The report was given to the concerned authorities on 3-2-1993. The enquiry report indicated that though the last date of hearing was 8-10-1992, the respondent No.1-employee did not participate after 3-10-1992. It appears that on 5-1-1993 the respondent-employee had made a prayer for grant of subsistence allowance which was not granted. In between, by making certain allegations against the Enquiry Officer the respondent No.1-employee had prayed for change of the Enquiry Officer. According to him, relevant documents were not supplied to him and Enquiry Officer was exhibiting bias. The prayer in this regard was made on 11-10-1992 which was rejected on 1-12-1992. It is relevant that in the order dated 1-12-1992 the Chairman had noted that in spite of adequate opportunities the charged officer did not effectively participate and was raising various untenable pleas obviously with the object of delaying the proceedings. The writ petition was resisted by the present appellant. It was pointed out that all documents had been made available to the respondent No.1-employee for the purpose of inspection and relevant copies were supplied. Therefore, adequate opportunity was granted to respondent No.1-employee to defend himself properly in the departmental proceedings.
(3.) The plea of the respondent-employee was that on 3-10-1992 all of a sudden the Enquiry Officer asked him to cross-examine the witnesses. Same was objected to by him as he was taken by surprise. But without properly considering the grievance all the four witnesses were examined and the matter was adjourned for further hearing. The respondent No.1 - employee filed his protest letters on 3-10-1992 and 7-10-1992 and requested the Enquiry Officer not to proceed in the matter and made a representation on 11-10-1992. But on 8-10-1992, four of the remaining witnesses were examined and the enquiry report was submitted.;