Deciding Authority: Supreme Court of India
Date of Judgement:6th February, 2003
Bench: Justice N Santosh Hegde & Justice B P Singh.
Facts of the Case: Brief facts necessary for disposal of this appeal are that these appellants when they were on duty as Rakshaks (Guards) of 733 UP goods train colluded with other officials in the said train and certain other miscreants by assisting them in the theft of large quantities of rice bags from the said goods train thereby causing huge loss to the Railways. The authorities after holding preliminary enquiries and considering the material gathered in the 3 reports received from such preliminary enquiries passed the impugned order. The appellants after exhausting the departmental remedies filed a writ petition before the High Court of Calcutta alleging various irregularities in the procedure adopted by the disciplinary authority and also contending that dispensation of the enquiry on the grounds recorded by the disciplinary authority was wholly unsustainable and violative of their constitutional right of being afforded an opportunity of a fair enquiry.
Judgement of the Case: The Supreme Court held that when such satisfaction of the concerned authority is questioned to be proved in a court of law, it is incumbent on those who support the order of dispensation to show that the satisfaction is based on certain objective facts and is not the outcome of the whim or caprice of the concerned officer. On the basis of the said principles, on the facts of that case, this Court came to the conclusion that the respondent-State was not able to satisfy the Court as to the existence of material facts from which satisfaction as to the dispensation of enquiry could be arrived at. In the present appeal before us, as discussed by us hereinabove, the Railways have produced materials based on which the satisfaction of the authority to dispense with the enquiry was made. Though this satisfaction was found to be erroneous by the learned Single Judge, the Division Bench rightly reversed that finding. In this appeal, we ourselves have perused the contents of the three internal reports and we are satisfied that on the facts of this appeal, the disciplinary authority had correctly based its satisfaction to dispense with the enquiry. The material found in the 3 internal reports, in our opinion, is sufficient to dispense with the enquiry. Therefore, we are in agreement with the judgment of the Division Bench of the High Court. Learned counsel for the appellants then relied upon certain Circulars of the Railway Board to show that there was an obligation on the disciplinary authority to have given a second show-cause notice before imposing the punishment of removal. We are unable to accept this argument also because we are not satisfied that this Circular in any manner imposed a statutory obligation on the Railways to issue such a show cause notice. At any rate, on facts of this case, we are satisfied that such a notice is not contemplated. For the reasons stated above, this appeal fails and the same is dismissed.
A COMPREHENSIVE WEBSITE FOR ALL LEGAL DEVELOPMENTS