Mahendra Dayal, J. - (1.) THE petitioner, by means of the instant writ petition, has prayed for quashing of the show cause notice dated 11.2.2000 issued by the Managing Director, P.C.F., Lucknow. The petitioner has further prayed for a direction to the opposite parties to ignore the said show cause notice and not to harass the petitioner in any manner.
(2.) THE case of the petitioner is that the petitioner was appointed as Junior Assistant on 10.9.1997. Subsequently he was selected and appointed as Store Keeper by the order dated 26.2.1981 and he joined on the said post at Deoria on 2.3.1981. In the year 1988 the petitioner was promoted as Senior Store Keeper. While posted as Senior Store Keeper at Gorakhpur, the petitioner was selected for Ware Housing Training and accordingly relieved for training. On 23.2.1995, the petitioner was transferred from Gorakhpur to Sultanpur and while working at Sultanpur he made a request for his transfer to some other place and on his request he was transferred to Ambedkar Nagar in the year 1996. While working at Ambedkar Nagar, the petitioner was served with a charge sheet and was also placed under suspension by the order dated 17.10.1996. Since the enquiry was not initiated for a quite long period the petitioner approached this Court by way of filing Writ Petition No. 7072(S/S) of 1996, which was disposed of by the judgment and order dated 26.9.1997, whereby it was directed that the disciplinary authority shall conclude the enquiry proceedings within a specified period and in case the enquiry is not completed within the period fixed by the Court, the suspension order shall stand revoked. The opposite parties in utter disregard of the aforesaid order did not conclude the enquiry and the petitioner was compelled to file contempt petition before this Court, in which the notice was issued to the Managing Director. During the pendency of the contempt petition the suspension of the petitioner was revoked and the contempt petition was disposed of accordingly on 28.10.1998. The enquiry officer after completion of the enquiry submitted the enquiry report on 29.7.1998, upon which a show cause notice was issued to the petitioner. The then In -charge Managing Director after considering the enquiry report and the reply of the show cause notice, submitted by the petitioner, passed an order dated 19.2.1999, whereby, the petitioner was awarded punishment of warning and further a direction for recovery of Rs. 10.80/ - was passed against him. The contention of the petitioner is that two charges were framed against him and in the enquiry the charge no. 1 was not found proved and the charge no. 2 was found partly proved. Since apart from the petitioner other persons were also found guilty, therefore, the petitioner was awarded lesser punishment. In pursuance of the order dated 19.2.1999, the petitioner deposited penalty amounting to Rs. 1080/ - and an entry of warning was made in his service record. To his utter surprise the petitioner was served with another show cause notice dated 11.2.2000 issued by the Managing Director as to why the order of punishment be not cancelled and also indicating therein that earlier In -charge Managing Director was not competent to pass final order on the disciplinary proceedings and award punishment to the petitioner. It is the second show cause notice which has been challenged by the petitioner in the instant writ petition.
(3.) THE submission on behalf of the petitioner is that once the disciplinary proceeding came to an end and the petitioner was awarded adequate punishment, the subsequent Managing Director has no authority to issue a second show cause notice and cancel the order passed by his predecessor and reopen the disciplinary proceedings. The petitioner has already faced a departmental enquiry and was also awarded punishment by the then Managing Director under the orders of this Court and as such the new incumbent on the post Managing Director has no authority to cancel the order passed by his predecessor.;