(1.) BY this writ petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner seeks quashing of the orders passed by the Disciplinary Authority and Appellate Authority; dated 29.12.2000 and 21.3.2001 respectively; by which the petitioner has been imposed penalty of reduction by four stages in his time scale of pay for a period of four years with cumulative effect. Petitioner was charged with giving illegal tube well connections without obtaining technical feasibility report and genuineness of load report, and which reports were required in terms of the circulars of the respondent/employer dated 23.5.1990 and 4.5.1987. These circulars read as under :-
(2.) THE Enquiry Officer by his report dated 15.3.2000 exonerated the petitioner, however, Disciplinary Authority disagreed with the findings of the Enquiry Officer and therefore issued a show cause notice dated 12.10.2000 to the petitioner attaching therewith the Enquiry Officer's report as also the reasons why the Disciplinary Authority proposed to disagree with the findings of the Enquiry Officer. Some of the relevant portions of this show cause notice by the Disciplinary Authority containing reasons for disagreeing with the report of the Enquiry Officer read as under :-
(3.) THE aforesaid order of the disciplinary authority was upheld by the Appellate Authority vide order dated 21.3.2001.