GOVT OF INDIA PRESS Vs. MONINDER KUMAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This writ petition is directed against a judgment and order dated 21/07/1999, passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi, in O.A. No. 2389 of 1993 whereby and whereunder the original application filed by the first respondent herein questioning an order of compulsory retirement, was allowed.

(2.) The first respondent was charge-sheeted on the ground that he had unauthorisedly absented himself from duty with effect from April 22, 1991. The only contention raised in the disciplinary proceedings by the first respondent was that he could not attend to his duties owing to illness. A punishment of compulsory retirement was imposed on him by the disciplinary authority by order dated 28/10/1992, and an appeal preferred thereagainst was also rejected. Before the learned Tribunal, the contention of the first respondent to the effect that as the petitioner herein treated the period of absence as dies non which was converted into EOL, in terms of Rule 27(2) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972, the absence of the petitioner was regularised and as such, the order of punishment imposed upon him was illegal.

(3.) The said contention of the respondent found favour with the learned Tribunal. Learned counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner would submit that the learned Tribunal acted illegally and without jurisdiction in passing the impugned judgment in so far as it failed to take into consideration that the said order dated January 10, 1992, having been passed under Rule 27(2) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972, the question of regularising his period of leave for a period of 259 days does not arise.