Hon'ble Manish Mathur,J.
(Oral)
1. The State has challenged judgment and order dated 6th March, 2019 passed by the State Public Services Tribunal, Lucknow in Claim Petition No. 274 of 2010; Rajwant Sharma versus State of U.P. and others, whereby the claim petition has been allowed setting aside the order dated 14th January, 2009 whereby punishment of stoppage of one annual increment temporarily for a period of two years and censure entry for the year 2008-09 was awarded to the opposite party No.1.
2. As per the averments made in the writ petition, while the opposite party No.1 was posed as an Executive Engineer, Saryu Nahar Khand-Pratham, Bansi, a charge sheet dated 27th March, 2006 was issued to the said opposite party who submitted his reply dated 27.4.2006 denying the charges levelled against him. Out of the five charges levelled against the delinquent employee, three charges were found established vide inquiry report dated 30th March, 2007 whereafter a show cause notice was issued to the petitioner and after consideration of reply by the delinquent employee, the punishment order dated 14th January, 2009 was passed against him.
3. The said punishment order dated 14th January, 2009 was thereafter challenged before the Tribunal in Claim Petition No. 274 of 2010. The claim has been allowed by means of the judgment and order dated 6th March, 2019 primarily on the ground that the inquiry proceedings were vitiated for non observance of the principles of natural justice inasmuch as neither any inquiry was held nor was the inquiry conducted in terms of Rule 7 of the U.P. Government Servants (Discipline & Appeal) Rules, 1999.
4. Heard learned State Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner and in view of the order being proposed to be passed, notices to the opposite parties are dispensed with.
5. The learned State Counsel at the very outset has restricted his arguments with the submission that even if the Tribunal had found lacunae in the procedure adopted for the inquiry, the only course available to it was for remanding the matter to the appropriate authority for conducting the inquiry afresh from the stage infraction in procedure was committed.
6. We have considered the submission in context of the issue involved, and the law on the issue. With regard to the aforesaid submission, the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Allahabad Bank and others versus Krishana Narain Tewari reported in (2017) 2 SCC 308 has held that although there is no quarrel with the proposition that in case the inquiry is found to be deficient, procedurally or otherwise, the proper course is always to remand the matter, but there may be situations where because of long time lag or other such supervening circumstances where the Court may consider it unfair, harsh or unnecessary to direct afresh inquiry. The relevant paragraph of the aforesaid judgment is quoted as follows:-
" 8. There is no quarrel with the proposition that in cases where the High Court finds the enquiry to be deficient, either procedurally or otherwise, the proper course always is to remand the matter back to the authority concerned to redo the same afresh. That course could have been followed even in the present case. The matter could be remanded back to the Disciplinary Authority or to the Enquiry Officer for a proper enquiry and a fresh report and order. But that course may not have been the only course open in a given situation. There may be situations where because of a long time-lag or such other supervening circumstances the writ court considers it unfair, harsh or otherwise unnecessary to direct a fresh enquiry or fresh order by the competent authority. That is precisely what the High Court has done in the case at hand."
7. The facts and circumstances of the case juxtaposed with the aforesaid pronouncement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court makes it amply clear that the same would be squarely applicable in view of the fact that the charges against the opposite party No.1 pertain to the year 2004-2005 i.e. about 15 years ago. Even the inquiry report was submitted in March, 2007.
8. In view of the aforesaid, the pronouncement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Allahabad Bank and others (supra) would be squarely applicable in the circumstances of the case due to long time lag of about 15 years due to which remand of the matter to the competent authority as sought by the learned State Counsel would not only be unfair and harsh but would also be unnecessary.
9. In view of the aforesaid, the writ petition being devoid of merits is dismissed.
Order Date :- 29.8.2019 prabhat