- (1.) The petitioner has invoked jurisdiction of this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India seeking to quash the order dated 29.8.1989 (Annexure P-5) passed by the punishing authority by which the petitioner was dismissed from service also treating the period of suspension as non-duty and order dated 5.3.1992 (Annexure P-1) of the Appellate Authority partly allowing his appeal converting the punishment from dismissal to compulsory retirement. The petitioner was working as Warehouse Manager in the respondent-Corporation. He was served with a charge-sheet, containing 11 charges constituting mis-conduct out of which charges No. 1 to 4 are as follows: 1. That he in connivance with Sarvshri S.P. Singh, GA; J.S. Mann, GA and Nirmal Singh, Accounts Clerk defalcated 2427 bags of KRIBHCO Urea causing loss to the Corporation equivalent to the cost of the said stocks; 2. That he in connivance with Sh. Lila Singh, TA defalcated 120 bags of rice at the time of delivery of stocks from G. No. 1 (Godown No. 1) and 4 and thus, caused financial loss to the Corporation equivalent to the cost of the said stocks; 3. That he in connivance with Sh. Lila Singh, TA showed excess shrinkage of 261 quintals in the rice stocks of 21301 bags delivered from G. No. 1, 3, 4 and 6 during 1987, and thus, caused financial loss to the Corporation equivalent to the cost of the said stocks; 4. That he in connivance with Sh. Harbans Lal, GA, defalcated 9 bags of KRIBHCO Urea out of G. No. 2 and 50 bags of IFFCO DAP out of G. No. 8 causing financial loss to the corporation.
(2.) The petitioner was suspended in the year 1988. He sent reply to the charge-sheet. A regular inquiry was held against him and on similar allegations against S/Sh. JS Mann, Godown Assistant (for brevity GA); S.P. Singh, GA; Nirmal Singh, Accounts Clerk. The Inquiry Officer submitted report dated 25.5.1989 (Annexure A-7) in respect of charges against the petitioner and dated 29.5.1989 (Annexure A-8) the joint inquiry report relating to other three officials. The Inquiry Officer held the charges against the petitioner to be proved. The petitioner was served with a show-cause notice of dismissal apart from proposal for imposition of Rs. 6,60,609/-as recovery towards the loss suffered by the respondent-Corporation. The petitioner filed representation against the said notice. After hearing the petitioner personally, the Punishing Authority, passed the order of dismissal of the petitioner and directed that the loss suffered by the respondent-Corporation be recovered from the dues available with the Corporation and for balance a civil suit be instituted. The period of suspension was treated as non-duty.
(3.) The petitioner preferred appeal Annexure P-6 against the order of punishment. The Appellate Authority, came to the following conclusions:- 1. Regarding charge No. 1, even though there is no proof of his connivance with official incharge of the godown, he, as Warehouse Manager and immediate incharge of the Centre, remains responsible, hence 25% of the total bags should come to his share as there were four officials involved. ding charge No. 2, there was no actual loss as the reported deliveries to the depositors were O.K. and no shortage claim was raised by the depositor nor any shortage is on record. But a case of attempt of defalcation and perhaps, real defalcation is indicated and it is not that defalcation gets reflected as shortage in overall deliveries due to spillage factor and other factor. On this charge, Lila Singh, TA was the prime accused along with the appellant. As there is no loss, question of recovery does not arise. 3. On charge No. 3, the shortage is exaggerated due to notional addition of 120 bags of charge No. 2. If that is subtracted, the net shortage per qtl. comes down although even then it is on the higher side compared to normal shrinkage/shortage. However, it is not unusual. Such shrinkage/shortages have been reported in several cases and all such cases are yet to be settled with the FCI. Normally it is hopped that these are got settled with proper justification. In other cases of same nature, I stayed the recoveries on the ground that there was no actual loss to the Corporation as the same still remained to the settled. Therefore, the recovery on this account is not justified at this stage. Let the outcome of settlement process be awaited and in that the fact of erroneous addition of 120 bags to the total quantum of shortage should be subtracted to see the per quintal shortage. 4. Recovery liability was already fixed on and recovered from Harbans Lal, GA so far as charge No. 4 is concerned.;