Jharkhand High Court: The Bench of Ananda Sen, J. set aside a punishment order issued against a police constable in departmental proceedings, for being in violation of principles of natural justice.
Petitioner, a constable in the police department, was served with a departmental charge sheet alleging misconduct. In the departmental inquiry was held. In the inquiry, charges against him were held not to be proved. The disciplinary authority, disagreeing with the findings given of inquiry report, punished him with two black marks and withheld his salary on the basis of no work no pay. The said order was challenged by the petitioner in departmental appeal, which was also dismissed by the appellate authority. Aggrieved thereby, the instant writ application was filed praying for quashing of the said order.
Petitioner’s only submission was that it is well within the jurisdiction and domain of disciplinary authority to differ with the findings of Inquiry Officer, but if the disciplinary authority wants to punish the delinquent, a second show cause notice has to be served and reasons for his differing from findings of the inquiry report must be mentioned in the show cause notice. This process had not been followed before passing the impugned order, and only on this ground, the impugned order could be set aside.
The Court noted that the respondent had not issued second show cause notice to the petitioner, but punished him after differing with the findings of the inquiry report. It was opined that this procedure was in utter violation of the principles of natural justice, as the petitioner ought to have been issued a second show cause notice indicating the ground of disagreement, before punishing him. Thus, the punishment order was set aside for being unsustainable in the eyes of law.[Lalit Oraon v. State of Jharkhand, 2019 SCC OnLine Jhar 279, Order dated 13-03-2019]